Ornette Coleman 'Sound Grammar'

[brownie]

This was recorded last year in Germany in 2005. No details available yet...

[robviti]

from bighassle.com:

For more than five decades, saxophonist/composer Ornette Coleman has played a pivotally seminal role in American music. The inventor of what has been called "free jazz," Coleman belongs to that rare breed of artists/thinkers whose influence extends far beyond the realm of their chosen medium. Always putting his remarkable virtuosity at the service of melody and emotion, he has had and continues to have a powerful impact on how musicians play, improvise, and compose, on how music lovers listen, on the color and sound of music the world over.

While Coleman has led a wide variety of formations, from duos to symphony orchestras, electric and acoustic, his basic musical concept has been remarkably consistent. He is interested in writing and performing music that allows all players to give free reign to their imagination and ideas. His musical system, which he named “harmolodics” and now prefers to call “sound grammar,” is a remarkable exercise in applied democracy. All voices are given equal weight; all musicians are free to make deeply individual contributions while listening closely to one another, at once giving & taking space for their respective creativity.

The release of Sound Grammar marks several firsts: the first release on Coleman's own, new label, also called Sound Grammar, the album is his first in more than a decade; his first live album in 20 years; and the first recording featuring his latest, now three-year-old, band. Composed of Ornette Coleman on saxophone, trumpet & violin, his son Denardo Coleman on drums, and acoustic bassists Tony Falanga (Orchestra of St. Luke's) & Greg Cohen (Tom Waits, Elvis Costello, John Zorn's Masada), this group sounds like no other on the music scene or in Ornette's career.

Beautifully recorded live in concert in Germany in late 2005, Sound Grammar showcases six brand new Coleman compositions and two remakes: "Song X,” originally featured on the 1985 album of the same name, and "Turnaround," from the classic 1959 LP Tomorrow is The Question . He explains: “When I get a job to perform I write a whole new program of music so that we don't perform something I have played before and that my musicians have not. I want them to be affected the same way I'm being affected. I only do that for the sake of equality, not because I want to be a great composer.”

Ornette explains further: "Sound grammar is to music what letters are to language. Music is a language of sounds that transforms all human languages." As original, innovative, and groundbreaking as anything Coleman has released in nearly five decades of record making, Sound Grammar is also one of his most accessible and melodic works to date. It is poised to rank among the key musical events of 2006.

[Aggie87]

The cover's upside down.

[robviti]

The cover's upside down.

not from where i'm sitting.

Edited September 7, 2006 by jazzshrink

[ep1str0phy]

So it's gonna happen then (not that I ever doubted, but)... the cover looks very Artists House (must be those florescent colors and that subdued, circa-70's font).

Edited August 25, 2006 by ep1str0phy

[jazzbo]

I'm not sure I'd say this group sounds like no other Coleman group! I heard them here in Austin and liked how they sort of sounded like the early quartet recordings to me. . . .

This is going to be GREAT!

[Lazaro Vega]

"...this group sounds like no other on the music scene or in Ornette's career."

Kalaparush Maurice McIntyre used this sax, two basses, drums format on record: "Humility In Light of Creator."

[ep1str0phy]

"...this group sounds like no other on the music scene or in Ornette's career."

Kalaparush Maurice McIntyre used this sax, two basses, drums format on record: "Humility In Light of Creator."

Homes, Ornette was using this format in the 60's. It's still a mighty shame that the Ornette/Izenzon/Haden/Blackwell group never got a proper album in the can. I just hope the superlative is deserved.

Edited August 26, 2006 by ep1str0phy

[Lazaro Vega]

Yes -- there's a boot of that band which I haven't heard. I'm very much looking forward to the new release. LOVED the band in Ann Arbor. It's enough to be a new Ornette album. That's all I need to hear.

[GregK]

Yes -- there's a boot of that band which I haven't heard. I'm very much looking forward to the new release. LOVED the band in Ann Arbor. It's enough to be a new Ornette album. That's all I need to hear.

me too! One of the very best shows I have been to

[JSngry]

"...this group sounds like no other on the music scene or in Ornette's career."

Kalaparush Maurice McIntyre used this sax, two basses, drums format on record: "Humility In Light of Creator."

Homes, Ornette was using this format in the 60's. It's still a mighty shame that the Ornette/Izenzon/Haden/Blackwell group never got a proper album in the can. I just hope the superlative is deserved.

I've got a live bootleg LP of that band that smokes. Sound is a little bottom-heavy, but not fatally so.

[ep1str0phy]

I may have heard the same thing. Is it the one with the Dancing in Your Head motif (they call it Tutti, I think). The band is killin.

[B. Clugston]

There's two boots - one poorly recorded with the "Dancing in Your Head" theme ("Tutti); the other in much better sound and includes "Lonely Woman" and a track where Ornette plays a double reed instrument (Yusef Lateef he ain't). Both were recently reissued as a 2 CD set on one of those hazy European labels.

Interestingly, Ornette's new group has revived a song that appeared on the same boot as "Tutti," a song called "New York."

[ep1str0phy]

I'd actually like to know if anyone has compiled a list of the known compositions played by the new quartet (or quintet, when it is). Song X and Lonely Woman, at least, have shown up numerous times--I had no idea about New York.

[B. Clugston]

The version of "New York" was played by the quartet plus one at the Carnegie Hall concert in June.

For a sample, go to http://destination-out.com/ and scroll way down....

[JSngry]

There's two boots - one poorly recorded with the "Dancing in Your Head" theme ("Tutti); the other in much better sound and includes "Lonely Woman" and a track where Ornette plays a double reed instrument (Yusef Lateef he ain't).

It's the latter which I have. Originally released on Joker, I think. I've got it on Lotus. The Haden/Izenzon/Blackwell hookup is freakin' primal. There's dancing in places other than the head going on!

[Lazaro Vega]

Titles have been hard to come by -- good thing there are a few mentioned in this review. Wrote Denardo a few times requesting the titles of the music played in Ann Arbor but to no avail. I bet the New York writer had access to O.C. and asked after the concert.

I'm looking forward to the CD. With as much concertizing and touring this band has done the CD is a snapshot of something bigger.

Can't imagine the sound with his two classic bassists. Do you hear the bass player's current "assignments" (mostly pizzicato for one, arco the other) as directly related to the earlier band?

[ep1str0phy]

The Haden/Izenzon band was fairly binary in bass assignments; Haden was his pizzicato stylist, Izenzon the arco (I still hold that few can move the bow like Izenzon--man, he's bad on those trio sides). Although both were fully capable of holding the other position, I suppose that Ornette's two-bass acoustic ensembles just fall most comfortably into the 'role' dynamic.

[JSngry]

$13.29 preorder @ CDU.

[king ubu]

These boots of the older (mid-sixties) quartet, can you give dates and locations? I've heard 1967-11-30 from Amherst, Mass (very bad sound, incl. Sadness, C.O.D. and a few unknown titles), and 1968-02-05 from Milan (Italy) (much better sound, incl. Tutti, Three Wisemen and the Saint, New York).

Here are setlists of the new quartet (didn't put them together myself, wouldn't be able to do so):

Liubliana (Slovenia), 2004-07-02:

1. Song X; 2. If I Knew As Much About You...; 3. Women of the Veil; 4. Skies of America; 5.-7. Unidentified; 8. New York; 9. Unidentified; 10. Turnaround; 11. Lonely Woman

Austin, TX, 2004-11-14:

1. Unknown; 2. If I Knew As Much About You...; 3. Tone Dialing; 4. Mothers of the Veil; 5. New York; 6. Air Ship; 7.-9. Unknown; 10. Song X; 11. Turnaround

Chicago, IL, 2003-09-26:

1. New York; 2. Unknown; 3. Picolo Pesos; 4. Woman of the Veil; 5. Unknown; 6. Song X; 7. Unknown; 8. Spelling the Alphabet; 9. Turnaround

[B. Clugston]

The ones I have are the Feb. 5, 1968 concert on Moon and a Rome concert on Nippon Crown. The set list for the latter (as it appears on the CD cover) is "Lonely Woman," "Mousieur Le Prince," "Forgotten Children" and "Buddah Blues." My CD says the latter is from 1967, but I believe it was recorded Feb. 8, 1968.

Both were re-released as The Love Revolution.

[Eloe Omoe]

Received a review copy of the new Ornette CD just yesterday. It sounds great. There's a very interesting version of "Turnaround".

luca

[B. Clugston]

Here's a photo of the original two-bass group (with Charles Moffett on drums)

http://www.espdisk.com/photos/esp25.html

[fkimbrough]

Picked up a copy of Sound Grammar today at J&R in Manhattan - I think Ornette's doing an in-store there on Friday.........anyway, it sounds great. Nice to see and hear a new one from OC.

[ep1str0phy]

None of the Berkeley or Oakland area music shops have a copy. I was all ready to buy one, too...