6. Ornette ColemanFree Jazz: A Collective Improvisation

This is another example from that period when I was at university and I was listening to jazz; when this album was released. And to be honest, it was really difficult music to listen to because it’s not organised, it’s completely chaotic, and it’s not a pleasant listening experience in the slightest. But I realised with this album that it’s a different way of hearing music. You don’t put it on while you sit by the fireside to read a book. It’s almost like chaos in a way, but it still all comes together – just – because it’s an ensemble still. 

So I thought it was really important to really expose myself to things like this, where it’s not a pleasant listening experience, but it’s shaking up what you felt music was all about. On the cover there is a Jackson Pollock painting [‘The White Light’ (1954)], and I thought that was a perfect thing, because it really seemed that Jackson Pollock was trying to reinvent what painting was, so Ornette was doing a similar thing in a musical sense. I’m not sure it influenced what I was writing, but It was important to listen to things that were jarring. I continue to seek those things out to this day. I can’t recommend anybody put in on if they want a quiet evening at home but it’s definitely an experience.