Newly uploaded video of Ornette Coleman playing Berliner Jazztage in 1971, with Dewey Redman, Charlie Haden, and Ed Blackwell: h/t to Hank Shteamer, uploaded by Bay Area drummer Jay Korber.
Category: Ornette Coleman
Very occasional quote of the day: Blackwell and Ornette
“When we were awake, we were always playing. If we were not playing, Ornette would be sitting down writing a tune, or we’d be discussing music, or listening to music—different tunes. But that was it. […]
Ornette Coleman 1930-2015
New York Times notice Ornette Coleman’s Revolution from The New Yorker Four songs @ Vox Rolling Stone notice Huffington Post notice The Guardian notice NPR notice
DBMITW: Ornette Coleman live, 1968
A little change in gears as we near the end of our little fund raising drive. A big thanks to the mighty few who have made donations and purchased books— if any of our other […]
Ed Blackwell on playing the Five Spot with Ornette
From Ted Panken’s 1986 interview with Ed Blackwell on WKCR NY: So when you got to New York, you found yourself in the midst of the scene that was shaking New York’s art community to […]
Ornette live in ’58
Here’s something remarkable: Ornette Coleman recorded live in LA in 1958, just before his big national exposure in New York. The band includes the musicians in his famous quartet: Don Cherry, Charlie Haden, and Billy […]
Daily best music in the world: Ornette live — 1973
I’ll be out for a couple of days here— playing at the Jazz Station in Eugene tonight with flugelhornist Dmitri Matheny, attending a memorial service for my partner/wife’s mother, and having my own birthday with […]
Transcription: Ed Blackwell — Happy House
UPDATE: Download link is now working! Here is Ed Blackwell playing the head of a fairly well known Ornette Colman tune, Happy House, with the band Old and New Dreams. The beginning of the tune […]
What’s going on: my recording of Ornette Coleman’s Mothers of the Veil
While I was traveling recently, I got a note from a reader who had very kindly purchased my CD Little Played Little Bird, the music of Ornette Coleman, asking for some analysis and explanation of […]
Everybody digs the same stuff, part eleventy
I’ve decided that one of the immutable laws of the universe is that everybody digs the same stuff— well, I’ve felt that way for some time, and it keeps getting confirmed. In this latest case: […]