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The avant garde/free jazz thread

by TimPhelan
17 replies
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I have loved this style of music since I was 17 or so when my cousin played some for me and told me about the history. He was the one who opened me up to blues, reggae and world music also. I love all types of music and never had a hard time getting into avant garde or free or abstract jazz because I was already into abstract art.

Ornette Coleman is widely considered to have released the first avant garde album in 1959 titled The Shape of Jazz to Come. There certainly were jazz musicians in the past however who heavily influenced this style such as Thelonious Monk, Bud Powell, Charles Mingus, etc...

Here's a couple pieces from that first album by Ornette Coleman who is still performing these days at the age of 84. Playing with Coleman is Charlie Haden on Bass, Don Cherry on trumpet and Billy Higgins on drums. ( I just found out by the way, that Haden just died yesterday. He was one of the greats on bass! )


  • Profile picture of the author Kurt
    Not "avant garde", but a couple of tributes to the guy credited with being the first jazz improv musician.



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  • Profile picture of the author TimPhelan
    From the 1965 masterpiece by John Coltrane A Love Supreme, Part 1 Acknowledgement. Featuring Coltrane on sax, Jimmy Garrison on bass, McCoy Tyner on piano and Elvin Jones on drums.


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  • Profile picture of the author Patrician
    Uploaded on Jan 13, 2009
    Jazz great McCoy Tyner plays two improvisational pieces at a memorial for Freddie Hubbard, who past in December 2008. The Memorial was held at Harlem historic Abyssinian Baptist Chruch.




    Roland Kirk with McCoy Tyner Stanley Clarke 1975
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    • Profile picture of the author TimPhelan
      Originally Posted by Patrician View Post

      McCoy Tyner - YouTube
      Uploaded on Jan 13, 2009
      Jazz great McCoy Tyner plays two improvisational pieces at a memorial for Freddie Hubbard, who past in December 2008. The Memorial was held at Harlem historic Abyssinian Baptist Chruch.



      Roland Kirk with McCoy Tyner Stanley Clarke 1975 - YouTube

      Roland Kirk with McCoy Tyner Stanley Clarke 1975
      Excellent Pat! Hey, you live in the East bay right? Do you ever go to Yoshis in Jack London square? I've seen some great music there. McCoy Tyner for many years used to come play there for a week at the end of the year. I'm not sure if he still does but we should get together and see him if he does.

      Roland Kirk was amazing.
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  • Profile picture of the author Dennis Gaskill
    Tim,

    Does that kind of music grow you on? I ask because, while there are a few jazz songs I like, some of the songs you played just sound like a bunch of people playing different songs at the same time. Is that part of the charm?

    I'm not trying to be insulting, I'm genuinely curious because I've just never been able to get into very much of the jazz world. Maybe this old country boy just ain't sophisticated enough for it.
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    • Profile picture of the author TimPhelan
      Originally Posted by Dennis Gaskill View Post

      Tim,

      Does that kind of music grow you on? I ask because, while there are a few jazz songs I like, some of the songs you played just sound like a bunch of people playing different songs at the same time. Is that part of the charm?

      I'm not trying to be insulting, I'm genuinely curious because I've just never been able to get into very much of the jazz world. Maybe this old country boy just ain't sophisticated enough for it.
      It's probably different for everyone Dennis and many will not ever get to appreciate this music for one reason or another. For myself, who was raised on listening to pop/rock/soul music in the 60s and early 70s it was a music I got into immediately upon first listening. Like I said in the OP I think the fact that I was already into artists such as Jackson Pollock, DeKooning, Picasso, Miro, Kandinsky etc... may have made me more open to the music. I think that's the key: being open and listening to it in a certain way.

      I think perhaps one reason Pat can relate to this type of jazz is because of the raw emotion in some of it which is probably why she also likes punk. What do you think Pat? The best art is emotional in my opinion.

      Like Pat, I don't always listen to Jazz. However, in the last 40 or so years I have seen more Jazz than any other type of music. It's great to experience in person. I've probably seen close to 500 jazz concerts in my time, although that has slowed down considerably the last decade.

      Knowing the history of jazz and how it evolved also helps I think. For example, the sax in jazz in the 60s and 70s used some of the honking and screaming for rhythm and blues artists. Listen to that Pharoah Sanders piece I posted ( which I think is very mainstream ), and then listen to these two blues sax players who were known for "honking and screaming".

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  • Profile picture of the author Patrician
    Dennis - you didn't ask me but let me answer you anyway. Whether I like Jazz on any given day is really a matter of MOOD. I have to feel very relaxed and very romantic. Both pretty rare these daze. In this way it is like classical music which is very complex and I have to be in the mood to appreciate it.

    Cracks me up what you said here: "sound like a bunch of people playing different songs at the same time." - yes it does as does all improvisational and experimental music - the more far out end of which I would always be in the mood for (cacaphony) - like for example industrial rock and punk.

    cacaphony
    a harsh, discordant mixture of sounds.
    "a cacophony of deafening alarm bells"
    synonyms: din, racket, noise, clamor, discord, dissonance, discordance, uproar

    It's a lot like life! ;o)



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  • Profile picture of the author Patrician
    Hi Tim.

    Yes I like raw emotion - actually i just like REAL. So tedious always maintaining a facade...

    I have a deep appreciation, almost spiritual, of all art forms. I don't believe art is really served by regimentation - because it is not natural it just takes something away from it. It takes discipline to develop talent but beyond that I think it is thwarted when it is done the same way every time - so I really like abstract anything - art or music. As I said above I like cacaphony - everybody marching to their own drummer all together.

    I actually started liking progressive jazz when I was a teenager. This was my wannabe a beatnik mode and I haven't really changed that much in that regard. I believe jazz like classical is highly intellectual - not in the sense of a bookworm which I'm not, but I guess cerebral is what I mean. It's interesting.

    intellectual
    of or relating to the intellect.
    synonyms:mental, cerebral, cognitive, psychological;


    Yeah it would be fun to meet up at a jam session -
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  • Profile picture of the author TLTheLiberator
    Never got into Jazz that much because my crowd came of age during the time Jazz Fusion era(Grover Washington Jr., Herbie Hancock, George Benson) was created and we seriously got into that but somehow I also brought this album and listened to it many, many times.

    It was Stanley Turrentine and Freddie Hubbard and it was a live album and I loved it.

    I haven't heard it in 15-20 years.


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