And This Is Because.

February 14th, 2007 by dave tilton · No Comments

Ornette album cover

“Ornette” by Ornette Coleman

One of the truly surreal moments of this year’s Grammy Awards broadcast was Carrie Underwood accepting her Best New Artist award from Natalie Cole and Ornette Coleman. Ornette COLEMAN? He was on the program to accept a lifetime achievement award, which gave the audience the rarest of treats: the creator and master of harmolodics giving a statuette to a singer from television’s “American Idol” program.

Life, at least my life, is an ongoing presentation of synchronicity (and did I mention the Police, whose final recording was “Synchronicity,” opened the Grammy program with a glad-to-be-back version of “Roxanne”?). Consider the recent book I checked out of the JFK Library last week, “Considering Genius” by Stanley Crouch, and page fifteen’s mention of “becoming a frequent listener to the swinging but metrically liberated interplay between the alto saxophonist (Coleman) and Ed Blackwell on ‘Ornette!’” Consider a week prior to borrowing Crouch’s provocative collection of essays on jazz, I had driven to Amoeba Music in Berkeley and purchased a new copy of “Ornette!” on CD.

I go back a long way with the “Ornette!” recording. I was six when it was released in 1961; I did not hear it for the first time until I had moved back into my family home eighteen years later. At that time I was busy deciding whether to return to college for my final semester or press on with Year Two of Death To Brain Cells. Back then a normal part of the day included putting the stereo headphones over my ears, placing the stylus needle on a chosen platter of vinyl, and letting the late afternoon spin its way into early evening. Back then I had spent an afternoon at the local library and checked out two LPs (this was still The Vinyl Era): “John Lewis Presents Jazz Abstractions” and the above-mentioned “Ornette!” My father’s lone comment regarding the former recording, “And this is because?” also sums up my feeling for that collection of music; the latter, however, is another thing entirely.

“Ornette!” begins with “W.R.U.” Don Cherry’s pocket trumpet solo following the intro, Monklike in its stop-and-go rhythm, plays hide-and-seek with the drum lines of Ed Blackwell (Crouch is absolutely correct: Blackwell’s drumming is the key to this recording; without its movement and awareness of the other players, this music would sound messy and pretentious) and Scott LaFaro’s lyricism on acoustic bass, followed by Coleman’s oddly avain response to Cherry’s solo (perhaps HE should have been the alto player known as “Bird” instead of Charlie Parker), then a return to the theme to close the piece. All four of the original recording’s compositions, as well as the bonus track (”Proof Readers”) included on the Rhino-issued CD, are equally intense, like adding gasoline to an already roaring fire.

The keys to these compositions are surprisingly melodic themes, especially considering all of the critical focus regarding Coleman’s alleged shortcomings in the melody department: this music offers plenty of evidence regarding his gifts as a writer, player, and arranger. Equally important and impressive is the sense of conversational soloing by all of the quartet’s members. There is no piano or guitar providing chords as roadmaps for the soloists; instead, the music is a result of what seems like four people giving each other directions at the same time and all four arriving at the intended destination as planned.

This recording’s collective sound has more in common with speech: the different phrase lengths within the solos, what is and is not emphasized within the phrasing, and the responses from the other members of the quartet, all directed by deep listening and not a way to explore new approaches to well-known changes. And, as Crouch pointed out, it swings really hard.

My father’s words regarding “Jazz Abstractions” could be used to describe my feelings for “Ornette!” As a statement, not a question: “And this is because.”

Near the end of the Grammy program, the Red Hot Chili Peppers performed one of their current songs in front of a banner with “Love To Ornette Coleman” printed on it. I was hoping he would join the Peppers on one of the band’s tunes. Maybe something well-known like “Under The Bridge.” No such luck. Besides, Coleman’s music is not about bridges.

To order “Ornette!” visit www.amazon.com or www.rhino.com. To check out “Considering Genius” by Stanley Crouch, wait a few days, then visit the JFK Library at 505 Santa Clara Avenue in Vallejo. I only have a few pages left to read.