Is a Love Supreme free jazz?

[JazzAt52ndStreet]

.....don't bash me to much for this question.

Are records like Coltranes: Love Supreme, and First Medidations classified as free jazz?....they seem to have rhythmic structure, but not really any melodic (to my ear atleast) structure.

Thanks-
52nd

[al j]

Originally Posted by JazzAt52ndStreet

.....don't bash me to much for this question.

Are records like Coltranes: Love Supreme, and First Medidations classified as free jazz?....they seem to have rhythmic structure, but not really any melodic (to my ear atleast) structure.

Thanks-
52nd

No, these are not free jazz. All of the themes are written.

[SilentKnowledge]

Nope.

[Captain Hate]

Absolutely not.

[Gary Sisco]

Give the cat a break.

[bluenoter]

So are y'all excluding those Coltrane pieces because "all of the themes are written," as Joe Christmas said, rather than improvised? Are there other bases for the exclusion?

52nd--

I know only Meditations, not First Meditations, but Meditations and A Love Supreme have plenty of "melodic structure." One may not be fully aware of the structure, but one can certainly hear and even hum or whistle some of the melodies--especially in A Love Supreme! I hope you'll keep listening.

[frankiepop]

well, we never get anywhere with these discussions becuz nobody knows what free jazz is...? i'll hack at it anyway....according to elvin jones none of these pieces were ever put to paper and composed and often they did not know what they were going to play until the downbeat....

i always find that the bop/modal fans always have a difficult time squaring a heros of theirs like coltrane, tyner, workman, garrison, and elvin venturing into the avant-garde...i think they feel like it's treason or leaves them out so they rationalize and deny an obvious reality ...well it's...not really free jazz..

[bluenoter]

Originally Posted by frankiepop

i always find that the bop/modal fans always have a difficult time squaring a heros of theirs like coltrane, tyner, workman, garrison, and elvin venturing into the avant-garde...i think they feel like it's treason or leaves them out so they rationalize and deny an obvious reality ...well it's...not really free jazz..

Those fans sound like straw men or women to me. I would think that rather, they'd be pleased that they were able to remain fans even when their heroes ventured further out.

Me, I'll believe whatever I'm told about what does or doesn't constitute free jazz.

[Jazzooo]

"...Meditations and A Love Supreme have plenty of "melodic structure."

A Love Supreme has 'plenty' of melodic structure? I guess it depends on your definition of plenty.

[bluenoter]

Jazzooo, for sure! I could hum you most of it, and even I can hear them modulating, etc.

Have you ever read the chapter in Lewis Porter's book Coltrane on the structure of A Love Supreme?

[chuckyd4]

"A Love Supreme" absolutely has melodic structure, and I would be hard pressed to file it as "free" jazz. In fact, all four of the sections are built on simple melodic motifs, which are slightly altered as the piece develops. There is plenty of writing on exactly this topic, so I won't spill too much more virtual ink here. But for starters, you could check out Frank Kofsky's book "John Coltrane and the Jazz Revolution of the 1960's" - probably a writer some people here have a problem with, but look at the chapter dealing with ALS, and you'll get some solid analysis of the structure of the piece.

I guess it depends where you're coming from when you're going to label something like this free or not-free, and frankly those words don't seem to mean too much these days. Interestingly, I have yet to meet a musician who is really worried about whether his music is one or the other. That should probably tell you all you need to know.

I guess a good question back to you (seriously) would be why do you need to know? What is it that's motivating you to ask this question? Why do you need that definition?

Okay, that's three questions

[chuckyd4]

PS Doug - we've had a copy of "Plays Well With Others" sitting in the used bin at the record store I work at for a few weeks now. I keep putting it on the end cap and up on the display to try to encourage people to buy it, but I live in a jazz-deaf town, unfortunately. I will keep trying though...

[sonic1]

Avant-garde, maybe

Free Jazz, not quite, though for the time maybe

A love supreme was an improvisational piece based off of the theme which they sang...."A-Love-Su-Preme....A-Love-Su-Preme....)

For the time there was not much jazz where such a loose theme created a whole album. It took the idea of Modal jazz and expanded the vocabulary, or rather the alphabet. By this time Coltrane was already making up his own scales based on ragas among other things. Certainly nobody had done anything like this before, and though to our modern ears it sounds like a fairly "in" album, then it was totally new. Also the subject matter was totally new, not too many artists were so blatently devoting their music to "God". Trane made the jazz version of a hindu chant.

Don't get too caught up over the terminology-free is a very relative term which has changed in jazz since at least 1949 when Tristano recorded Intuition and Digression, and before when people were just playing around. I prefer the term "out" but that too has changed in meaning because of the relativity factor. Ornette Coleman used to be "Out" and now Wynton Marsalis covers him. Our ears no longer find his early stuff so far out.


Jared

[frankiepop]

it may not have been too far out even then...if i am not mistaken then i believe that ALS won downbeat's critic and READERS poll for best lp ...

but speaking of out then that's where i have to get ready to go...

after a southpark post.....mmkay?, blunote mmkay


frankiepop OUT!

[Dan G]

I'm not going to speculate yes or no (not knowing enough about music, technically, to discuss the make-up of ALS, but have concerns about 2 comments here:

1) Joe Christmas: "No, these are not free jazz. All of the themes are written."

As far as I understand things, this does not preclude it from being free jazz. Ornette wrote themes, Ayler wrote themes, etc, but it is what develops after that determines if it is 'free jazz' or not, isn't it. Your statement would apply to free improvisation.

2) Sonic 1: "Avant-garde, maybe
Free Jazz, not quite, though for the time maybe"

I think you are confusing the concept of free jazz with avant garde. How can something be free at the time, but not now?

[JazzAt52ndStreet]

So if I understand you guys correctly, there are a set of chords that the band is modulating over on theese records/songs?
Obviously, there are repeated themes to thoose songs...But for example, the theme for a love supreme is one measure long...I don't know if that alone classify's the song as a structured-composition.

-52nd

[Jazzooo]

Anazlyzing something after the fact, even if you uncover patterns and structure, does not make it a fully-composed piece. I definitely hear the one-measure composition of A Love Supreme. What happens for the rest of the piece seems quite spontaneous to me.

""A Love Supreme" absolutely has melodic structure, and I would be hard pressed to file it as "free" jazz. In fact, all four of the sections are built on simple melodic motifs, which are slightly altered as the piece develops."

I don't disagree with this, but...this is an example of analyzing something after the fact. What you describe here could absolutely, positively occur in a totally free setting, where musicians are free to hang onto riffs and motifs, embellishing them when they want. Free doesn't mean no repetition, no development of themse, does it?

I don't consider ALS an example of free jazz, but I do consider it an example of free group improvisation on a simple theme.

[Jazzooo]

Just to personalize it...

I often (but not often enough) sit at the piano and record my improvisations. I am not consciously composing, but merely reacting to how I feel at the moment. When I play something that moves me, I'm very likely to repeat it, modulate it or otherwise extend it. Analyzing the recording afterwards it might seem to someone who wasn't there that I knew what I was doing, but that would be untrue. Even if a form presents itself down the road, it wasn't my intention.

[petros]

Free music doesn't refer to music that has no form, time, or changes. It simply refers to music that is played from a state of liberation.

"Free jazz" can be based on "forms" such as: Random Sequence, Just Sound Piece, Long Notes, Cascading Notes, Harmonic Piece, Free Rhythmic Groove, Drone in E, Time No Changes, Fast Time No Changes, A Prayer in Minor, etc.

"A Love Supreme" features a short repeated chant like theme over a drone, then they freely do whatever happens.

[sonic1]

Free is a relative term and jazz is not organized enough to have calcified that specific of a definition, and if it had, the evolution of jazz would quickly make too many exceptions, and has.

Avant-garde just means the use of unconventional or advanced technique. There is really no solid definition for these terms so it is stupid for us to argue about it.

Love Supreme is based on a sort of modal structure-the theme presents a home-base and the tonality of the themes are based off of one of Coltranes made-up scales, which is influenced by Ragas.

The song structures were free. They just followed each other, which at the pace and tonality of these tunes, was not too hard. There was probably either visual ques or discussion before playing as to how much space each musician would solo for. I would imagine from the sound of the album they just went on visual que. Remember these are some of the best musicians in the world playing here. They can practically read each other's minds. That is what made this quartet so damn good.

It is actually ingeniously simple giving the improvisors quite a lot of room to roam without sounding too dissonant. Sort of like a modal tune, but the mode is not a traditional one.

So 52nd, there was some form-the tonality, the theme to vary, but the form seems to be quite free, left open for soloists to finish statements, quite like Ornette used to do with his unusual usage of space in his phrasing. Now do we want to call it free jazz? I think it is somewhat its own thing really but certainly consisting of many free elements.

Jared

[Enforcer]

Well, among other things, the tune Pursuance is basically a minor blues.

I guess I'm so well acquainted with this recording that it doesn't sound all that "free" to me. It doesn't resemble Interstellar Space, for example. For me, it was Rashied Ali's arrival in the group that signalled the beginning of the really free explorations for John Coltrane. I realize some seminal recordings like Ascension were made before that time, but the way Elvin played just didn't sound like it fit with Trane's concepts by that point.

Larry

[sonic1]

I agree with Rashied, et al the band went into truely free territory. But remember the classic quartet also raised hairs. The reaction to the village vanguard shows as we all know was quite mixed...mainly because they really pushed the boundaries.

I get your point on the love supreme recordings. Just because there are several tones not usually used in jazz with trane at this point does not mean it was necessarily all that "out".

I think by the standards of the day it was an unusual album. If ECM was doing its thing at the time, maybe that music would be more alligned with that scene, as that is the music I think it closely resembles.

Jared

[Khaled Ahmad]

To me, the album sounds "free", while there are motifs repeated throughout the album, but when those are not around, the band seems to take a pretty liberal approach to recording the album. In fact, I consider this album much more free then a lot of Ornette Coleman's stuff. It doesn't sound to me that Coltrane wrote any of those licks beforehand or if he did, it almost sounds like he took the approach of "We'll play these whenver it sounds appropriate."

I think a lot of people think that the only way you can play "free" is if its an album full of saxaphone screams and honks

[sonic1]

Free is not the same as improvisation. Almost all jazz albums have a degree of improvisation, generally a "head" that influences the improvisations. In this case the head is only a measure long, instead of 32 or 16. So there is more liberty in what you play.

But I agree with you. Not all free music is jarring. I have been trying to get that point acrossed for a long time. There is, however, a certain degree of "in"-ness to the album which is why it was so popular.

Honestly there is no sharp edge between free and standard jazz. It is a gradient. And this album falls into the grey territory for sure.

Jared

[Darryl G. Thomas]

I've never thought of ALS being a "free" recording. I'd heard Coltrane's later music before I heard ALS and thought it was quite tame in comparison. As a matter of fact I felt it was conservative when compared to the Village Vanguard recordings with Dolphy.

Don't know whether I could classify ALS as free, but I'd say all of the '65 albums are.

First Meditations, Transition, Sun Ship, etc., sure as hell ain't bop!!

[Jazzooo]

By the way, Chuckyd--thanks for pushing the CD. Maybe you need to offer a cash rebate or something...

[Dennis Gonzalez]

Originally Posted by Jazzooo

By the way, Chuckyd--thanks for pushing the CD. Maybe you need to offer a cash rebate or something...

Chuck...get it out of the CD case and play the CD often. Lots of people will end up ordering it because the used one will be gone.

A Love Supreme is worship.

[frankiepop]

A Love Supreme is worship.

nuff said

[Tom Storer]

Originally Posted by sonic1

Avant-garde just means the use of unconventional or advanced technique.

?? Does this mean that masters of bebop, for example, don't have advanced technique? Or that the musicians of the 60's free-jazz movement haven't produced widely followed conventions of their own?

Originally Posted by Dennis Gonzalez

A Love Supreme is worship.

Yeah, but is it free worship, melodically structured worship, modal worship? Get with the program here.