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Free jazz or Free Form in the early- to mid-1970s is a style of avant-garde jazz or an experimental approach to jazz improvisation that developed in the late 1950s and early 1960s when musicians attempted to change or break down jazz conventions, such as regular tempos, tones, and chord changes.
- late 1950s, United States
free jazz, an approach to jazz improvisation that emerged during the late 1950s, reached its height in the ’60s, and remained a major development in jazz thereafter. The main characteristic of free jazz is that there are no rules.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
Apr 30, 2024 · Free jazz was a much misunderstood – and even maligned – genre when it emerged, but it resulted in some of the finest modern jazz.
- Charles Waring
- 19 min
The roots of free jazz trace back to New York’s Five Spot jazz club in the Bowery. As the story goes, an alto saxophonist named Ornette Coleman walked into the club in 1959 and began playing freeform jazz on his plastic saxophone.
- Ornette Coleman (1930-2015) Regarded as one of the founders of free jazz, saxophonist Ornette Coleman possessed a unique improvisational voice. His quartet’s arrival in New York, with a much-discussed residency at the Five Spot, was hugely controversial, and the band’s sound was unlike any that had come before it.
- Eric Dolphy (1928-1964) A multi-instrumentalist, Dolphy is best known as an alto saxophonist, and for being one of the first musicians to play the bass clarinet in a jazz setting.
- John Coltrane (1926-1967) A musician who needs little introduction, Coltrane’s distinctive tenor saxophone sound was heard in a range of stylistic settings through the 1950s and ’60s, both as a bandleader and as a sideman.
- Alice Coltrane (1937-2007) Born Alice McLeod in Detroit, Michigan, she worked as a jazz pianist in various straight-ahead and swinging settings, including with Lucky Thompson, Kenny Clarke and the vibraphonist Terry Gibbs’ quartet.
Aug 10, 2021 · Free jazz stemmed from a basic principle, one that most musicians (and indeed, most artists) are familiar with: learn the rules—then break them. Like the avant-garde movement in visual arts, free jazz was an attempt to break from the traditions of jazz and create something entirely new.
The creation of the free jazz style is credited to Ornette Coleman, an alto saxophonist who shirked many of the conventional notions about how jazz was played and structured. Many people wonder when did free jazz start.
