Ornette Coleman - Complete Live at the Hillcrest Club

Just as the famous 1940-41 Jerry Newman recordings at Minton’s and Clark Monroe’s Uptown House captured the transition from Swing to Bebop, the music on this CD (compiled here in one set for the first time ever) marks one of the first steps from Bebop into what would soon be called 'Free Jazz'. The whole quintet consisted of modern players working with the same concept: a freer way of playing Jazz, which transcended the strict confines of melody, harmony and rhythm. They would create a whole new idiom by constructing music via the interplay of simultaneous collective improvisation. These concerts are the only known recorded works of Paul Bley with Ornette Coleman, Don Cherry or Billy Higgins, both separately and as a unit. Even though it may not have been a regular unit or a stylistically defined group, the quintet heard on these historic Hillcrest recordings shows a highly creative level, and transmits a contagious excitement and a continuous search for new musical ideas and new ways to express themselves that makes this music as impressive today as it was when it was first performed nearly fifty years ago. Gambit. 2007. Album Description

Beautiful, really

Having read about this album for years with great anticipation and despite the woeful artwork and wrong track listing - track 5 is 'Ramblin' and not 'When Will the Blues Leave?' as listed - you can't help but be moved and excited listening to the face of jazz changing with each bar. Coleman, Cherry, Haden and Higgins play together and individually beautifully with Bley playing somewhat the role of 'guest' or 'active spectator'. Not a criticism but merely an observation. Haden plays a similar double/triple stop solo at the end of 'Ramblin' to the one he plays on 'Change of the Century' - a solo that captures the essence of what the entire group, heroically led by Ornette, were probably trying most earnestly to achieve - an earthy, swinging, free, bluesy, and truly spontaneous way forward. Free. The back of the CD unambiguously states FILE UNDER JAZZ. Indeed. June 28, 2007

The Birth of Free Jazz

Though jazz historians may argue as to what is the first free jazz album, most people would agree that Ornette Coleman is one of the main contenders. However, there is little documentation of Ornette Coleman's classic quartet (here augmented by Paul Bley who helped found the group and went on to be a known avant-jazz musician on his own). This cd (from 2lp's, one originally released in Paul Bley's name)are the only known live concerts of this extremely influential group. Though this is sound is a little rough, you can clearly hear the pieces and the phrasing and it is certainly more "out there" than Ornette Coleman's first two official albums (his group's style did not come together until "The Shape of Jazz to Come") and has pieces that would appear on later albums (including one predictably entitled "Free") along with standards. Considering that the pieces are subject to intense improvisation (lasting up to 14 minutes) if you buy this you are holding a piece of free jazz history in your hands. With Ornette Coleman still around (catch him live if you haven't already)its good to see his unreleased recordings get their due. However, Ornette Coleman's peak was in the recordings of his classic quartet and to hear it live is to hear a meeting of the minds, a concert where the right sounds and ideas came together and free jazz as an art form congealed. May 21, 2007

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