Free Jazz

[poetrylover3]

After a lifetime of listening to jazz I still don't get it. Help with good entry points will be greatly appreciated. I love Hard bop-especially the Blue Note 60s sessions, if that helps.

Thanks in advance.

Peace,

Jeff T

[DMP]

"Out To Lunch?" Maybe some of the Pharoah Sanders' Impulse titles, which can be free and groovy at the same time?

[Dan Gould]

Aric can tell you a lot about "free" jazz.

[John Tapscott]

One free jazz date that works for me is Cecil Taylor's "Conquistador". It seems to have some structure to it (though not in a formal way, obviously). It is not easy listening by any means, but it has some ebb and flow, some "moods", some degree of logic to it. It might be a place to start.

[Tom Storer]

Blue Trane, if you've tried repeatedly over a lifetime of listening to jazz and it hasn't grabbed you yet, what makes you think there's a magic entry point that will change the way you hear it?

If I were you, I'd just accept that it's not my cup of tea and live happily ever after!

[sidewinder]

I find Andrew Hill's 'Compulsion' and Grachan Moncur III 'Some Other Stuff' to be very listenable transitional albums. It took me ages to get into this stuff at all too.

[JohnS]

Not quite free jazz but inline with some of the suggestions above - I'd recommned Cecil Taylor's 'The World of Cecil Taylor' on Candid. Just avbput the most exciting piano jazz I've heard.

Archie Shepp's 'Four For Trane' is suberb. Similarly the New York Contemporay Five is a fine intro too - the only available music is on a Storyville cd.

[Niko]

i found Marion Brown's ESP albums and the two Prince Lasha / Sonny Simmons albums on Contemporary rather accessible...

[Guy Berger]

Blue Trane, do you like Coltrane's A Love Supreme? If so I would start listening to Coltrane's '65 quartet recordings chronologically.

Other accessible avant-garde or semi-avant-garde dates:

Miles Davis, Miles Smiles, ESP, Filles de Kilimanjaro

Sonny Simmons & Prince Lasha, The Cry, Firebirds

Eric Dolphy, Out to Lunch, Far Cry, Out There, Live at the Five Spot 1 & 2, Outward Bound

Mingus, a bunch of stuff

Andrew Hill, Point of Departure, Black Fire, Judgment, a bunch of other stuff

Bobby Hutcherson, Dialogue, Components

Archie Shepp, Four for Trane

Guy

[jlhoots]

Ornette Coleman

Lacy / Rudd

[Guy Berger]

Ornette Coleman

Good call -- The Shape of Jazz to Come, Turn of the Century, This Is Our Music would be the three to start with

[J.A.W.]

Blue Trane, if you've tried repeatedly over a lifetime of listening to jazz and it hasn't grabbed you yet, what makes you think there's a magic entry point that will change the way you hear it?

If I were you, I'd just accept that it's not my cup of tea and live happily ever after!

My thoughts exactly.

[king ubu]

Cecil Taylor's music around the time he did his two Blue Notes was *very* structured. Not "not in a formal way", but in a much more complex way!

[Niko]

Blue Trane, if you've tried repeatedly over a lifetime of listening to jazz and it hasn't grabbed you yet, what makes you think there's a magic entry point that will change the way you hear it?

If I were you, I'd just accept that it's not my cup of tea and live happily ever after!

My thoughts exactly.

thought this too sometimes but am glad actually that i didn't give up and tried out different things from time to time; still remember very well when i got my first charlie parker compilation at 14 and after 4 or 5 listens had this moment of "so this is how this is supposed to be meant" and have enjoyed the music a lot ever since (not that i'd believe anymore to really have figured out how Charlie Parker meant Yardbird Suite ) with free jazz it took me longer and of course there is something ridiculous in listening to music you don't really like just because you have read that it is excellent but after all i would have missed so many great listening experiences had i given up [and now you may say i am still not REALLY getting it but am just telling myself that i do because i don't want to feel stupid or uneducated or whatever; but that's not how i am perceiving it, so even if it were the case that i am just pretending - i don't think it would matter]

[Quincy]

Ornette Coleman

Good call -- The Shape of Jazz to Come, Turn of the Century, This Is Our Music would be the three to start with

Strangley enough these were the first 3 I started with. I owned Shape for at least a year, played it 1/2 a dozen times and didn't get it. Like the origianl poster, I wasn't going to give up. This Is Our Music had just entered the CD market (outside of the box) so I tried it. There were some brief moments where I thought it might be clicking, but not really. But I'd put it on every month or so anyway. Came across a used Turn Of The Century and figured I might as well invest another $7 in this mystery. BAM!

Not sure if it was the playing of the other 2 over a period of time that laid the ground work for "getting it" & loving it with Turn Of The Century, or if it was finally hearing the right entry point. I suspect some it is due to the lead song "Ramblin.'"

Some things take time. Sometimes time doesn't help. Keep trying till you're sure.

[paul secor]

After a lifetime of listening to jazz I still don't get it. Help with good entry points will be greatly appreciated. I love Hard bop-especially the Blue Note 60s sessions, if that helps.

Thanks in advance.

Peace,

Jeff T

It might help if you'd tell us what free jazz you've listened to (and not gotten).

Edited May 28, 2007 by paul secor

[BruceH]

It's just jazz with everything you like about jazz subtracted.

Either that or the giveaway bin at your local flea-market.

[Chuck Nessa]

It's just jazz with everything you like about jazz subtracted.

Either that or the giveaway bin at your local flea-market.

[clifford_thornton]

Blue Trane:

I made a mix-CD of this type of music for someone who had the same question as you. Sam Rivers, Eric Dolphy, Stanley Cowell, a bunch of stuff.

PM me if you'd like a copy.

[Chuck Nessa]

Try the AEC's Nice Guys on ECM.

[MoGrubb]

re: Free Jazz

...haven't gotten there yet. -_-

[Morganized]

Aric can tell you a lot about "free" jazz.

[Aggie87]

Try the Clusone 3, or some Jimmy Giuffre - Free Fall or the '61 material.

[Guy Berger]

Jimmy Giuffre - Free Fall

I think this is pretty extreme for someone who's not into free jazz.

Guy

[Guy Berger]

Walter Davis wrote a fantastic primer on avant-garde jazz for fans of straight-ahead jazz about 10 years ago and posted it to rec.music.bluenote. I am reproducing it here:

hi all,

this is for folks who are looking for an introduction to the avant

garde. I'm writing this from the perspective of a straight-ahead jazz

fan who began exploring this branch of jazz about 5 years ago. Folks

from other perspectives may not find this very useful and there's no

guarantee that straight-ahead folks will either. Remember, it's not

really important that you like all or any of this stuff. The various

recordings I'll be mentioning are not meant to necessarily be

representative of or classics within a given type of music. They're

things I like and that either helped me get into the music or that I

think will help others. Obviously, strictly following my advice is no

better than strictly following anyone else's. When I say "if you don't

like X, you probably won't like Y" that's just my opinion - don't reject

Y just because I said so.

One thing to be clear about from the beginning is that there really is

no avant garde jazz. This term usually loosely refers to an array of

distinct musical styles, many of which are 30 or more years old. This

is important to remember because disliking one outside style does not

mean that you'll dislike them all (and vice versa). There was an

article by Kevin Whitehead in the Village Voice about a year ago where

he tries to more precisely categorize various styles of the avant garde,

and I'm going to try to follow his categories here. You might find it

easier if you explore one 'style' at a time rather than sampling a

little from each one (although that's not how I've gone about it). In

general, I think it's hard to immediately grasp this stuff because it

can be very different. It'll be even harder to grasp 5 or 6 different

things simultaneously.

You also might prefer seeing some of these folks live if you get the

chance. It's been my experience that a lot of straight-ahead fans have

a hard time connecting to avant-garde jazz on record - maybe because the

off switch is so handy. :-) But I've seen some of these same people

really connect to live performances, where I think they get a better

sense of how everything goes together and realize that it's not as

chaotic as it sometimes sounds.

Hopefully other folks will add on and improve this list. And before

anyone gets worked up, I'm not wed to any of these categories, they were

just the most convenient way for me to organize this. Other caveats

include my lack of exposure to European jazz and that I generally prefer

more energetic music (but not too much so!). And the big caveat is that

I have virtually no technical knowledge of music. I will use terms like

"structure" or "musical elements" and these should be treated as nothing

more than vague terms (not unlike "avant garde"). However, since the

categories in part distinguish among pieces of music or musicians based

on whether they rely on "tradtional" or "non-traditional" structures,

I've tried to make some judgments that I'm not really qualified to make.

I've tried to use two criteria - whether a piece sounds significantly

"different" from "standard" jazz to me and whether I've seen critics,

rmb posters, etc. refer to this musician or album as one displaying

"non-traditional" structures. If a piece meets both criteria, I've

categorized as I saw fit. Of course, since you can almost always find

some critic or rmb poster who will say that about a musician, it really

comes down to the first criterion (big surprise!). Hopefully those with

more musical knowledge will correct some of my mistakes.

I've organized this article into three parts. Part 1 presents a list of

classic albums and musicians which I think form the primary starting

point for avant-garde jazz - sort of prerequisite listening. Part 2

explores the categories and tries to give some more detail on how I went

about classifying things. Part 3 (in the next post) gives lists of

albums, some with comments, categorized as best I can. Just so nobody

feels left out, I've also included a list of straight-ahead albums

released in the last 20 years or so that I've enjoyed.

Part 1: The background

You'll often hear comments about how the avant-garde doesn't honor (or

play in, isn't part of, etc.) ‘the tradition'. Nothing could be further

from the truth. The Association for the Advancement of Creative Music

(AACM), probably the single most important group within the US avant

garde scene, was founded with the express purpose of celebrating and

extending the tradition of African-American music. Their motto (if

memory serves) is: great black music, ancient to the future. The

avant-garde draws heavily on the work of the classics, sometimes

reaching back to the very beginnings of jazz, and they were doing so

long before the current crop of traditionalists came along (but with a

rather different purpose in mind).

Anyway, I think it's important to have some knowledge of the artists who

most strongly influenced the a.g. These are folks who meet any

definition of jazz - Coleman (pre-Prime Time), Monk, Mingus, Ellington,

Coltrane (esp. the pre-ALS Impulses), Davis (esp. the 5tet with

Shorter), and early Taylor. It's probably not necessary to explore each

of these (although I highly recommend it) and other names could easily

be added to this list. But my point is that if this music still sounds

somewhat foreign, strange, dissonant to you, you may not want to push

farther in. You can't really go wrong with any of these folks, but some

personal favorites:

COLEMAN - Shape of Jazz to Come and Change of the Century (Atl), the 2

live BN's; MONK - Genius of Modern Music 1 & 2 (BN), Monk's Music

(OJC), Brilliant Corners (OJC), Big Band/Quartet (Columbia) and Alone in

SF (OJC); MINGUS - Black Saint and the Sinner Lady (Imp), Mingus

Presents Mingus (Candid), New Tijuana Moods (BMG), Changes 1&2 (Rhino),

Mingus Ah Um (Columbia); ELLINGTON - Far East Suite (BMG), and His

Mother Called Him Bill (BMG), Afro-Eurasian Eclipse (OJC),

Blanton-Webster Years (RCA); Coltrane - Giant Steps (Atl), Crescent, At

Birdland, A Love Supreme (all Imp - I get to the later stuff below);

Davis - Plugged Nickel, Miles Smiles, ESP, Complete Concert 1964 (incl.

Four and More) (all Columbia, the last has G. Coleman rather than

Shorter); early Taylor - Jazz Advance (BN), Jumpin' Pumpkins (Candid)

(someone else should jump in here, this is not my forte)

Additionally, there's a trio of 60's Blue Note discs which are central

to the development of my jazz tastes and really my whole conception of

what the best jazz achieves - Eric Dolphy's _Out to Lunch_, Bobby

Hutcherson's _Dialogue_, and Andrew Hill's _Point of Departure_. Others

will no doubt disagree, but I think understanding these albums is an

important step towards avant garde jazz. These aren't strictly

‘background' but I think they're fairly introductory. There are a

number of other Blue Note albums from the same period which would

probably also work - in addition to other albums by those artists, look

for Sam Rivers, Tony Williams, Grachan Moncur, Jackie McLean (some of

it), etc.

I do prefer more energetic stuff, but I'm starting to get into the more

contemplative side of jazz. I think some important early recordings of

this type would include Lennie Tristano (_New Tristano_ on Rhino), MJQ

(_Dedicated to Connie_ on Atlantic is very nice), and the Jimmy Giuffre

3 (a nice 2-disc set on ECM, also a budget-priced Atlantic, a couple of

nice Hat Arts). I still haven't gotten around to them, but I would

think that Mulligan's pianoless quartet goes here. These albums are

important not just for introducing a certain introspection to jazz, but

also for being some of the earliest examples I know of which avoid

strict head-solo-head formats and challenge some other jazz conventions.

Finally, there's late period Coltrane. These aren't necessarily easy to

get into, but they open the door to a huge portion of avant-garde music.

These are highly energetic, emotional, somewhat dissonant and

unstructured performances. The emphasis is not so much on the

compositions and only somewhat on the group interaction. The main

emphasis is on the soloist and where he or she wants to take himself and

the listener. (I don't mean to denigrate the importance of the

ensemble). My faves so far are _Major Works_ ("Ascension" really),

_Interstellar Space_, _Meditations_, and parts of _Live in Japan_.

Check out _Sun Ship_ and _Stellar Regions_ which have recently been

(re-) released. If you like ALS but find yourself not liking these, you

might try _Transition_ and _JC Quartet Plays..._ which are closer to the

classic quartet sound.

Part 2: The Categories

As I said, I'm taking these categories from Kevin Whitehead's article

"Death to the Avant Garde" from the Village Voice (March 21, 1995).

This piece argues against the use of a single term to describe this

music, because the term is not only contradictory (this "style" of jazz

is over 35 years old, how avant garde can it be?) but also because there

are in fact many styles of "avant garde" jazz. This quotes sums up the

article best:

Assuming jazz evolved out of its own historical roots around

1900, the historical avant-garde surfaced more than a third of

the music's lifetime ago. Even the most squeamish should be

able to place it in context by now.

I think there are some problems with his categories, which I'll get to

in a bit, and neither he nor I believe that any artist should be

pigeonholed into a category. In fact, many (most?) of the musicians

fall into more than one category. I think you could legitimately put

David Murray into all four. Hell, Sun Ra may have created all four (in

one album!) and, as always, it took everyone at least 10 years to catch

on :-). But it is a handy framework and at least gives us a place to

start beyond the single term. There's really no way to decide which of

the categories to plop a borderline artist into, so I've done it by

emphasizing the way that I most strongly relate to the music or by the

way that I first reacted to the music. For example, although I read

about Cecil Taylor imposing non-traditional structures on his music

(which would suggest he belongs in "restructuralism"), I primarily react

to the emotion and energy of what I've heard of his later music so I put

this music into "expressionism".

FREEBOP is the first category, which Whitehead describes as: "the music

of Ornette Coleman and its offshoots: boppy/melodic heads followed by

linear free improvising or, as in Ornette's case, blowing which permits

spontaneous deviation from or supension of the head's chords or chorus

structures." This category may be a bit narrow for my purposes because

of the emphasis on the head-solo-head format. If we changed that part

of the definition to something like "the basic tune contains easily

recognizable jazz elements" while still allowing for the "linear free

improvising ... " we'd have a working definition for a lot of the

"in-out" stuff on my 90's list. (That might help save the

‘restructuralism' category below)

Following Whitehead's strict definition, we would almost be limited to

Coleman's direct disciples - Cherry, Haden, some of Redman's work,

Ulmer, etc. And, of course, the Davis-Shorter quintet whose music I

find to relate more closely to this category than any of the others.

There are a ton of tracks from numerous artists that would fit into this

category, but on albums that might not otherwise fit. As such, I'm

going to expand the definition along the lines that I suggested above,

and use this as a sort of catch-all category for music which has a

strong (and I mean _strong_) "traditional" jazz content and doesn't

screw around too much with structure and instrumentation.

Unfortunately, that means that pretty much everyone you can think of

falls in this category from time to time. It also means that "freebop"

is no longer a good descriptive term for this category, but I'm not

overly fond of Joe Germuska's suggestion of "neo-classical" because I've

seen that term used too often to describe "straight ahead" jazz. But I

intend this category to serve as the primary starting point for most

folks - if you like the Coleman, Davis, Mingus, early Coltrane Impulse

stuff I've listed above, I think you'll be comfortable with the items in

this category. Included in this category are some albums that I

consider to be straight-ahead but are by musicians who, rightly or

wrongly, are considered avant-garde or at least esoteric.

EXPRESSIONISM is what I think most people think of when they hear the

term ‘free jazz'. This is the wild, wooly, honking, squeaking, high

energy, take no prisoners, sounds like chaos (or tortured cats) kind of

jazz. However, it's hardly the predominant style of avant garde jazz.

This is the category that late Coltrane prepares you for, so if you

can't dig _Interstellar Space_ or _Meditations_ or something similar,

there may not be much point in you further exploring this category. My

tastes run heavily to saxophonists and it's the instrument I identify

with this category, but I'm sure there are non-saxophonists in this

category. As I noted above, I'd put the later Cecil Taylor that I've

heard (and it's not much) in this category.

This music is not nearly as chaotic or freeform as the description might

suggest. When I listen to a Charles Gayle or David S. Ware, I hear

clear references to Coltrane, Ayler, even Rollins (in Ware's case).

There is a certain structure, or regularity perhaps, to much of this

music. In fact, I often find that it sounds too much alike, hardly what

it would be like if it didn't reference _a_ tradition (even if not _the_

tradition). I think one source of difficulty for many folks is that,

moreso than any other form of music, it is about the personal, emotional

expression of the artist - and either you go along for the ride or you

don't. When it takes you, there's no better musical experience (IMHO);

but when it doesn't, you're left with little besides marvelling at the

musician's technique, energy, and stamina. (In case you can't tell, I

think the idea that these musicians are playing expressionistically to

cover up a lack of technique is ludicrous). My guess is that fans of

alternative rock or other loud, dissonant music would be most

comfortable jumping in here.

RESTRUCTURALISM is an ugly term with a vague definition, but it's the

best I've heard. Whitehead states that restructuralism "posits

alternatives to theme-solo-theme and/or soloist + rhythm section, or

other standard practices." Well, when you get right down to it, that

just about covers all of avant-garde jazz. When we briefly discussed

how to describe the type of music on my list of jazz in the 90's, some

folks suggested this term, which I would consider to be accurate for

some of it but not most. I am going to take Whitehead's definition a

little further and create two sub-categories. The first will contain

music that is essentially freebop with odd instrumentation - i.e. music

with easily identifiable jazz elements mixed with "free" improvisation

but which distinguishes itself with voicings created by odd

instrumentation. In other words, music that's not too strange except

that there might be a tuba playing the bass line or the band consists

entirely of saxophones. I'm a little wary, but I'm going to stick jazz

which borrows heavily from music of another culture here. Something

like Zorn's Masada is essentially Colemanesque freebop with some klezmer

thrown in which strikes me as not being much different in spirit from

freebop played by a sax quartet. The second is for music that sounds

sufficiently different that I assume that non-traditional musical

elements are at work (see my note above about my lack of technical

knowledge) and which may or may not also use non-traditional

instrumentation. For better or worse, I think I end up putting most of

the contemplative, introspective avant-garde stuff that I've heard in

this category. This is an incredibly broad category - a lot of it isn't

vastly different, just different enough that I wasn't comfortable

calling it freebop.

Obviously there's a very thin line between these two sub-categories as

well as between restructuralism and freebop. Does Braxton's piano

quartet playing standards belong in freebop (it's not that weird) or the

‘different structures' subcategory of restructuralism? Or do we note

that it's not that weird except that Ehrlich's reeds are sometimes

playing the traditional piano role while Braxton plays the sax on piano

(as suggested by Whitehead) and decide that this is really more in tune

with the ‘odd instrumentation' subcategory? And do bands like Masada

belong here or down in the "post-modernism" category?

Both sub-categories would make a "logical" next step after freebop.

Also, fans of brass bands or big bands might find the first sub-category

appealing. Fans of classical music might find that some of the more

introspective music in the second sub-category would be a good place to

start. If you really enjoy Mingus, Sun Ra, and Ellington, both of these

categories might appeal to you, but especially the first one. And if

you like the Hill, Hutcherson, Dolphy and/or Tristano, Giuffre, MJQ

albums I mentioned earlier, I think you'll like a lot of the stuff in

the second sub-category.

POST-MODERNISM is unfortunately just as anachronistic a term as

"avant-garde" at this point, but it seems to have a fairly

well-recognized definition. Don't be intimidated or think that I'm

trying to impress you. Post-modernism, in this context, simply refers

to music which juxtaposes numerous styles of music, or "parody and

pastiche" as Whitehead says. Wynton Marsalis's recent long-form

compositions are post-modernist, juxtaposing New Orleans with swing with

blues with bop with Shorteresque post-bop. Some of John Zorn's stuff is

also postmodernist. As Whitehead points out, this category more than

any other points out how pointless it can be to differentiate between

avant and non-avant. I think it also highlights just how old and

traditional some forms of the avant-garde are - Ellington, Mingus and

Sun Ra were doing this sort of thing 40 years ago. A lot of this

material is big-band or large ensemble, so fans of that type of music

might find this a good entry point to the avant-garde. Similarly,

if you really dig Ellington, Mingus, or early Sun Ra, you should give

some of this stuff a try.

Unfortunately, there's a lot of grey area in post-modernism as well.

Bill Frisell's _Have a Little Faith_, which juxtaposes Copland and Ives

with Dylan and Madonna, is clearly postmodernist. But what about

Clusone 3 who do something similar to Irving Berlin as Frisell does to

those composers, but they're not "juxtaposing" anyone else in there? Or

Muhal Richard Abrams's _Blu Blu Blu_ or Air's _Air Lore_, which are

freeform explorations of blues and rags respectively. What about Joe

Henderson's tribute albums to Strayhorn, Davis, and Jobim. If those

were juxtaposed on one album, we could certainly argue that it was

post-modernist. I can't say that I'm consistent on this one.