ORNETTE COLEMAN - Something Else!!!!: The Music of Ornette Coleman / Tomorrow Is the Question!: The New Music of Ornette Coleman
CD1 - Something Else!!!!: The Music of Ornette Coleman
Contemporary C 3551
Ornette Coleman (alto saxophone); Don Cherry (trumpet); Walter Norris (piano); Don Paymne (bass); Billy Higgins (drums)
Recorded between February and March 1958
Invisible / The Blessing / Jayne / Chippie / The Disguise / Angel Voice / Alpha / When Will The Blues Leave? / The Sphinx
Recorded between February and March 1958
CD2 -Tomorrow Is the Question!: The New Music of Ornette Coleman
Contemporary M3569
Ornette Coleman (alto saxophone); Don Cherry (trumpet); Percy Heath, Red Mitchell (bass); Shelly Manne (drums)
Recorded at Contemporary's studio in Los Angeles. ‘Lorraine’ was recorded January 16, 1959. ‘Turnaround’ and ‘Endless’ were recorded February 23, 1959. The other selections were recorded in one session, the night of March 9-10, 1959.
Tomorrow Is The Question! / Tears Inside / Mind And Time / Compassion / Giggin’ / Rejoicing / Lorraine / Turnaround / Endless
The two albums have been re-released in 2022 under the title ‘The Genesis of Genius’: The Contempoarary Albums
(Released on Craft Recordings CR00321).
CD1 - Something Else!!!!: The Music of Ornette Coleman
Contemporary C 3551
Ornette Coleman (alto saxophone); Don Cherry (trumpet); Walter Norris (piano); Don Paymne (bass); Billy Higgins (drums)
Recorded between February and March 1958
Invisible / The Blessing / Jayne / Chippie / The Disguise / Angel Voice / Alpha / When Will The Blues Leave? / The Sphinx
Recorded between February and March 1958
CD2 -Tomorrow Is the Question!: The New Music of Ornette Coleman
Contemporary M3569
Ornette Coleman (alto saxophone); Don Cherry (trumpet); Percy Heath, Red Mitchell (bass); Shelly Manne (drums)
Recorded at Contemporary's studio in Los Angeles. ‘Lorraine’ was recorded January 16, 1959. ‘Turnaround’ and ‘Endless’ were recorded February 23, 1959. The other selections were recorded in one session, the night of March 9-10, 1959.
Tomorrow Is The Question! / Tears Inside / Mind And Time / Compassion / Giggin’ / Rejoicing / Lorraine / Turnaround / Endless
The two albums have been re-released in 2022 under the title ‘The Genesis of Genius’: The Contempoarary Albums
(Released on Craft Recordings CR00321).
The emergence of Ornette Coleman in 1958 is rather like a butterfly emerging from a chrysalis and quickly learning to fly free. It was almost instant and the challenge was there from the start. Ashley Kahn in the accompanying notes says: ‘Embraced or derided, the music challenged long-held ideas of what jazz—what music—should sound like.’ From the start Coleman’s alto was known for its playfully melodic and vocal-like quality. He was playing these beautiful, emotional lyrical lines.
Ornette Coleman’s first recordings startled many people in jazz.1958’s ‘Something Else!!!! The Music of Ornette Coleman’ and 1959’s ‘Tomorrow Is the Question!’ The New Music of Ornette Coleman. It was a direct challenge to what had been before. Coleman’s innovations had been derided by many musicians around the clubs of Los Angeles, Paul Bley was an exception. Lester Koenig of Contemporary Records decided to give Coleman and Don Cherry the space and time to make two albums. It was very unusual for unknowns to be given an album that would consist of all original tunes. Koenig had good taste as well as a risk-taking attitude. Koenig was a friend of composer Arnold Schoenberg and had a previous career in the film industry. He had been mauled by Senator McCarthy of the House Un-American Activities Committee. communist hunters. Contemporary Records had already distinguished itself by recording many west coast musicians such as Chet Baker, Art Pepper, Lenny Niehaus, Hampton Hawes, Shelly Manne and even Sonny Rollins on his first visit to the west coast. The recordings were noted for their clarity and definition. However, it was Lester Koenig who first recognized Coleman’s genius when he walked into his Melrose office at a time when the saxophonist wasn’t even welcome in most clubs.
Roy DuNann was the recording engineer. Many connoisseurs of recorded sound consider that DuNann’s work is finer than Rudy Van Gelder. Certainly, you can hear the pristine uncluttered sound on the two albums. When asked about his reaction to recording Coleman DuNann was not impressed: He said: ‘I would have sent him home. Yeah. I got so I could listen to a lot of the jazz stuff and know where one chorus was going to end and the next one begin. It was important for knowing where to make a splice. But with Ornette, you couldn't tell where you were. It just started out and it ended. It wasn't music at all for me.’ The reissued recordings here have been remastered by Bernie Grundman who learnt about sound from DuNann.
The original first album, ‘Something Else!!!!’. had Coleman’s band with Don Cherry on trumpet, pianist Walter Norris, bassist Don Payne and drummer Billy Higgins. With nine Coleman originals, the session introduced several tunes that became standards, including “The Blessing” and ‘When Will the Blues Leave?’ It was one of the last Coleman albums to feature a piano, Coleman avoided the instrument for most of his career. Drummer Billy Higgins had been at school with Don Cherry and had been part of a group they formed called Jazz Messiahs. Many of the pieces on ‘Something Else!!!!’ had been written in the early fifties. The themes are little jewelled batteries of power and light energy. Tightly composed themes have an immediate bop like feel but as soon as the theme is completed the improvisation is based on the inspiration of the moment. The sound of Coleman like an urban bluesman is straight from Texas, formed in a world of sleazy bars, honky tonk clubs and travelling minstrel and RandB blues bands. It is raw, insistent, human, edgy, almost coarse but instantly memorable a good contrast to Cherry’s wispy trumpet sound. The astonishing raw energy Coleman brings to his playing is memorable. The rest of the group are no match for this intensity. Walter Norris is from a different school and Cherry’s cornet playing is soft and without edge. ‘Invisible’ is fast and the raw energy alto and trumpet are paced together. ‘When Will The Blues Leave?’ a beautiful theme endured across the years. Payne and Preston are playing in a different world.
It is interesting to listen to a bootleg recorded at the same time at the Hillcrest Club. The pieces are more relaxed and much longer. It is obvious that the bop roots are quite strong when the group plays Charlie Parker’s ‘Klactoveesedstene’.
‘Tomorrow Is The Question!’, like its predecessor, has some great themes: ‘Rejoicing’ ‘Tears Inside’, along with ‘Giggin’’ and ‘Endless’ are album highlights. Pianist Walter Norris is left out as is bassist Don Payne. Bass responsibilities are shared between Red Mitchell and Percy Heath. The missing pianist freed Coleman and the improvisation is noticeably freer. ‘Mind and Time’ is reminiscent of ‘Salt Peanuts’ it has an open structure as does ‘Compassion’. ‘Turnaround’ is one of those pieces that Ornette used over the years. ‘Tears Inside’ is quite simply one of the most beautiful themes that Coleman produced.
The move to the east coast in 1959 was partly helped by composer Gunther Schuller, John Lewis of the Modern Jazz Quartet and Nesuhi and Ahmet Ertegun the founders of Atlantic records where the quartet was going to record the series of albums that were to shock and change jazz.
The critic Martin Williams, who persuaded Joe Termini, the owner of the Five Spot club in New York to book Coleman’s band, wrote: ‘I believe that what Ornette Coleman is playing will affect the whole character of jazz music profoundly and pervasively.’
Reviewed by Jack Kenny
Ornette Coleman’s first recordings startled many people in jazz.1958’s ‘Something Else!!!! The Music of Ornette Coleman’ and 1959’s ‘Tomorrow Is the Question!’ The New Music of Ornette Coleman. It was a direct challenge to what had been before. Coleman’s innovations had been derided by many musicians around the clubs of Los Angeles, Paul Bley was an exception. Lester Koenig of Contemporary Records decided to give Coleman and Don Cherry the space and time to make two albums. It was very unusual for unknowns to be given an album that would consist of all original tunes. Koenig had good taste as well as a risk-taking attitude. Koenig was a friend of composer Arnold Schoenberg and had a previous career in the film industry. He had been mauled by Senator McCarthy of the House Un-American Activities Committee. communist hunters. Contemporary Records had already distinguished itself by recording many west coast musicians such as Chet Baker, Art Pepper, Lenny Niehaus, Hampton Hawes, Shelly Manne and even Sonny Rollins on his first visit to the west coast. The recordings were noted for their clarity and definition. However, it was Lester Koenig who first recognized Coleman’s genius when he walked into his Melrose office at a time when the saxophonist wasn’t even welcome in most clubs.
Roy DuNann was the recording engineer. Many connoisseurs of recorded sound consider that DuNann’s work is finer than Rudy Van Gelder. Certainly, you can hear the pristine uncluttered sound on the two albums. When asked about his reaction to recording Coleman DuNann was not impressed: He said: ‘I would have sent him home. Yeah. I got so I could listen to a lot of the jazz stuff and know where one chorus was going to end and the next one begin. It was important for knowing where to make a splice. But with Ornette, you couldn't tell where you were. It just started out and it ended. It wasn't music at all for me.’ The reissued recordings here have been remastered by Bernie Grundman who learnt about sound from DuNann.
The original first album, ‘Something Else!!!!’. had Coleman’s band with Don Cherry on trumpet, pianist Walter Norris, bassist Don Payne and drummer Billy Higgins. With nine Coleman originals, the session introduced several tunes that became standards, including “The Blessing” and ‘When Will the Blues Leave?’ It was one of the last Coleman albums to feature a piano, Coleman avoided the instrument for most of his career. Drummer Billy Higgins had been at school with Don Cherry and had been part of a group they formed called Jazz Messiahs. Many of the pieces on ‘Something Else!!!!’ had been written in the early fifties. The themes are little jewelled batteries of power and light energy. Tightly composed themes have an immediate bop like feel but as soon as the theme is completed the improvisation is based on the inspiration of the moment. The sound of Coleman like an urban bluesman is straight from Texas, formed in a world of sleazy bars, honky tonk clubs and travelling minstrel and RandB blues bands. It is raw, insistent, human, edgy, almost coarse but instantly memorable a good contrast to Cherry’s wispy trumpet sound. The astonishing raw energy Coleman brings to his playing is memorable. The rest of the group are no match for this intensity. Walter Norris is from a different school and Cherry’s cornet playing is soft and without edge. ‘Invisible’ is fast and the raw energy alto and trumpet are paced together. ‘When Will The Blues Leave?’ a beautiful theme endured across the years. Payne and Preston are playing in a different world.
It is interesting to listen to a bootleg recorded at the same time at the Hillcrest Club. The pieces are more relaxed and much longer. It is obvious that the bop roots are quite strong when the group plays Charlie Parker’s ‘Klactoveesedstene’.
‘Tomorrow Is The Question!’, like its predecessor, has some great themes: ‘Rejoicing’ ‘Tears Inside’, along with ‘Giggin’’ and ‘Endless’ are album highlights. Pianist Walter Norris is left out as is bassist Don Payne. Bass responsibilities are shared between Red Mitchell and Percy Heath. The missing pianist freed Coleman and the improvisation is noticeably freer. ‘Mind and Time’ is reminiscent of ‘Salt Peanuts’ it has an open structure as does ‘Compassion’. ‘Turnaround’ is one of those pieces that Ornette used over the years. ‘Tears Inside’ is quite simply one of the most beautiful themes that Coleman produced.
The move to the east coast in 1959 was partly helped by composer Gunther Schuller, John Lewis of the Modern Jazz Quartet and Nesuhi and Ahmet Ertegun the founders of Atlantic records where the quartet was going to record the series of albums that were to shock and change jazz.
The critic Martin Williams, who persuaded Joe Termini, the owner of the Five Spot club in New York to book Coleman’s band, wrote: ‘I believe that what Ornette Coleman is playing will affect the whole character of jazz music profoundly and pervasively.’
Reviewed by Jack Kenny
