Free Jazz?

[exarctly]

Still say Out To Lunch is free jazz. In that it has much more free sound and style than it does any other kind of tonally centered jazz. I know that it is very well structured and arranged as somewhat melodic tunes/heads. But so its a lot of other free jazz. I consider anything free that is not based on chord changes for improvisation. And anything where most of the improv is free. IMO Any album that can be more categorized as free than structured in the traditional way, to me gets to use the term free jazz. Maybe it is less free than say a Cecil Taylor album, but it is not much less free than most things by Ornette. Even much of Albert Ayler stuff has a strong sense of melody and arrangement. Any time you listen to improv and there really is not recurring chord cycles or repeating vamps or motifs, I think it is more free than anything else. Almost all the bass playing drumming and Vib playing seems very free to wander wherever it wants to as do most of the solos. During the solos the rhythm section nver locks in to something that is cycled through repeatedly. If it is not free tell me how you would improvise on it using tonal centers during which bars of the choruses? Or what cycle of tonality you would use as a comper that would repeat every 2-36 measures? If the answer is, you wouldn't most of the time, you would just play anything you wanted...then I think it is free jazz. No offense to those who differ with me on this, I just really think this album is free more so than anything else you could call it.

I could be wrong. But I am not convinced now. The best I can see on a quick re-glance throguh the tracks is maybe Gazzelloni the vibes seem to repeat a certain amount of material or shapes solo to solo. That would make it closer to being less free. Still, I do not see this same type of thing on every track and even on this one it seems like the other players are very free. I see sometimes patterns locked down mainly by the vibes on some of the tracks...but at the very least I hope we could agree that there are a lot of elements of free jazz in this record, while I would still put it in that category of my library even if some of you would not.

Though I am willing to be shown that I am missing something in my understanding of this album or the style. The thing that perhaps I would also entertain is that labeling jazz is sort of a controversial thing already. Since a lot of great jazz is difficult to label and is a blend of a lot of things we do and do not know. So this album perhaps is best thought of in those terms. Just good music. Still, I do feel comfortable calling Bird Bebop, Desmond/Brubeck Cool Jazz. Count Basie swing. "So What" modal jazz. Cecil Taylor free, and I would say Out to Lunch free more so than anything else. So labels I do not think are always bad. Just when we get handcuffed by them.

[Extrapolation]

Equating "free" with "avant-garde" or "experimental", or simply stuff that is more "outside" than classic bop, this music is some of my favorite. Without getting into semantics, here's some recordings I find essential (you'll notice within this list there's a huge variety of music, which is why I don' want to concern myself with the exact meaning of "free"):

Eric Dolphy - Outward Bound, Out There, Far Cry, Live At The Five Spot Volumes 1 & 2 (including Memorial Album), Conversations, Iron Man, Out To Lunch!, Complete Last Recordings In Hilversum & Paris

Ornette Coleman - Something Else!!!!!, Tomorrow Is The Question!, The Shape Of Jazz To Come, Change Of The Century, This Is Our Music, Free Jazz: A Collective Improvisation, Live At The Golden Circle Volumes 1 & 2

Cecil Taylor - Unit Structures

John Coltrane - Complete 1961 Village Vanguard Recordings, Complete 1961 Copenhagen Concert, A Love Supreme, Impressions, Live At Birdland, My Favorite Things: Live At Newport (1963 and '65 shows in one set), Ascension, Meditations

Albert Ayler - Spiritual Unity

Boker Little - Out Front

Grachan Moncur III - Evolution, Some Other Stuff

Bobby Hutcherson - Dialogue

Sam Rivers - Contours

Jackie McLean - Let Freedom Ring, Right Now!, Destination... Out!

Joe Henderson - In 'N' Out, Inner Urge

Tony Williams - Life Time

Archie Shepp - Four For Trane

Andrew Hill - Black Fire, Point Of Departure, Compulsion!!!!!

John McLaughlin - Extrapolation, Where Fortune Smiles

Larry Young - Unity

Miles Davis - In A Silent Way, Bitches Brew

Wayne Shorter - The All-Seeing Eye

Dave Holland - Conference Of The Birds

Anthony Braxton - 3 Compositions Of New Jazz, For Alto

Bill Frisell - Rambler

Also, thanks for the suggestions in the thread everyone, keep 'em coming.

[exarctly]

Please people who like free and avante garde. I really recommend the work of the Vandermark 5 and the Chicago Underground trio (or quartet or duo...though be warned, there is a lot of use of electronics).
Vandermark's compositions are really cool, and his understanding if the history of avante garde is deep.

[whatswisdom]

I really recommend the work of the Vandermark

I'm with you on that. Love his playing. I also have the Chicago Tentet 3CD set, some live; some studio recordings. He's all over it on those.

[ES125er]

Please people who like free and avante garde. I really recommend the work of the Vandermark 5 and the Chicago Underground trio (or quartet or duo...though be warned, there is a lot of use of electronics).
Vandermark's compositions are really cool, and his understanding if the history of avante garde is deep.

Worth noting: Jeb Bishop (the V5's trombone player) plays some great guitar parts on some Vandermark 5 tracks.

[TH]

There's another thread here on Pat Metheny. Of course he's known as a melodic player on harmonically structured pieces, but when he was in Miami as a student, he was known as a formidable free player. He used to play with Jaco, and he had a group Kaleidoscope that was a free improv band. Makes you think about how much that contributed to his ability to create such well structured solos over tonal material.
David

[exarctly]

Described below.
Wayne Shorter Footrpints live
Jean Michel Pilc Trio Live at Sweet Basil's volumes one and two
Paul Bley Ramblin and Closer

Another record that I do not want to say is or is not free but is a great jazz record is Wayne Shorter's Footprints live with Danilo Perez, Pattituci, and Brian Blade. I love the freedom these guys play with. I kind of wish more jazz sounded similar in theory to this.

Jean Michel-Pilc had a piano trio that used to exist that took standards, and honestly they either were re-harming them on the spot but being very wild and musical with their interpretation that I thought was way more about the structure of the tune than the chord changes. That is, they would often be in the form measure wise but they were more improvising off the shape of the tune structure wise than harmony wise was Jean Michel-Pilc trio.
There was form so it was not free, but they had a lot of freedom. Live at Sweet Basil's volume 1 and 2 are really cool recordings. And some of you may be fans of the drumming style of Ari Hoenig who plays a lot in NY now but I first hear of him in this French trio. Around or just after the turn of the century.

And Paul Bley back in the late 60's had some really good free playing type trios. I really hear something special in this music.

A lot of what I hear in Pat's tonal playing is random bursts of inside outside playing. A lot of side stepping stuff with cool pentatonic shapes. He is really good at blending the inside outside thing, but makes it all sound like it makes sense.

[exarctly]

I would love to hear someone discuss the MD second Quintet. I am curious to know how they wove in and out of form. I know they were not a free group (Miles made some good fusiony free music of course the next decade) but sometimes I think they are willing to let themselves break free from the form harmonically and even structurally. But I have never studied it in depth. Any good links or threads about their approach?

[Vihar]

He is really good at blending the inside outside thing, but makes it all sound like it makes sense.

Well, I would think it's because it does make sense in the end. As Mattymel said in another thread, as long as there's a release, it worked.

[nakim55]

Check out James Emery with the "String Trio of New York." He plays some really great electric guitar on drummer Thurman Barker's "Voyage" & "Time Factor" CD's. James also has a lot of great CD's under his own name. I hung out with James & he could play along with ANY Bud Powell or Bird solo, note for note, from memory, at tempo, right along with the LP (this was in 1979, no CD's then, or any transcriptions, James learned this all by ear). James was also a Monk fanatic, and could play all of Monk's solos and explain any chord voicing Monk did in detail. Despite his expertise in the tradition, James had his own style put together, which did not sound like any of those guys. A true master, who has been sadly overlooked. By the way, he can play as "FREE" as anybody, or as "inside" as anybody.

[TH]

Check out James Emery

Absolutely! The string trio recordings with Billy Bang are some of my absolute favourites. They really swing and they're very free and tight at the same time. As far as I've known he's always played an acoustic Jimmy D'Aquisto on all the recordings I've heard, really a chamber instrument played in a way that brings out the best in that guitar. The Spectral Domains recording shows a range of playing with a jazz chamber ensemble, and one of the best readings of Monk's Trinkle Tinkle out there.
Thanks for reminding me of his work.
David

[nakim55]

Actually the bassist with the String Trio of New York (John Lindberg) is from my home town of Marshall, Michigan. John took drum lessons from me before he switched to string bass in 1975. In 1979 I lived in NYC and got to watch the String Trio rehearse all the material for their first LP at John's east side apartment. It was musicianship & creativity at the highest level. James was playing a classical nylon string at the time. He used a Epiphone (I think a red "Crestwood"- not sure if that is the exact model name/ spelling) & polytone back then for his electric playing. Yea, Billy Bang is my favorite edition of that group. I have a cassette tape of them jamming with Dewey Johnson (trumpeter on Coltrane's ascension LP), that those LP's don't even touch. They were on FIRE!

[TH]

Free and chamber jazz for the whole family. Yeah it really is just that.
Here's proof, even the baby seems to like it!:

James' solo begins about 3:30 but it's all worth checking out.
David

[nakim55]

I actually think the best representation is the "Live in Erie" video on you tube. & for his electric playing check out "smoke detector" under james emery on you tube. Another side note, Bill Laswell from "Last Exit" is from Albion, Michigan (where I was born), which is 12 miles east of Marshall, Michigan. I never heard Laswell play any Be-Bop, but he sure did play a lot of FUNK in the black clubs on Austin Ave.

[TH]

Last Exit!! Love the Cassette '87 recordings. Sharrock and Ronald Shannon Jackson. ' saw Ronald Shannon Jackson with Power Tools and my ears are still ringing.
Thanks for the recommendations. I'll check it out.
David

[paynow]

I actually think the best representation is the "Live in Erie" video on you tube. & for his electric playing check out "smoke detector" under james emery on you tube. Another side note, Bill Laswell from "Last Exit" is from Albion, Michigan (where I was born), which is 12 miles east of Marshall, Michigan. I never heard Laswell play any Be-Bop, but he sure did play a lot of FUNK in the black clubs on Austin Ave.

[nakim55]

Thanks for putting the videos up of James Emery!! I appreciate it.

[paynow]

Thanks for putting the videos up of James Emery!! I appreciate it.

You're welcome.