The O.C.

Ornette Coleman, Massey Hall. Ok, but first, I have to tell a story about O.Coleman that I don't know myself. I heard it from D while we were walking out of Massey Hall after the show, and I read another part of it later on. So I'm second-hand here. Anyway, so Coleman was playing at a place called the Five Spot in NYC in 1959. It was like 'a turning point in history' and everyone is totally going to this show and Ornette is freaking them out. Miles Davis said after catching his set that he thought Ornette must be "all screwed up inside". Dizzy Gillespie supposedly walked up to the bandstand after a performance and said "you're fucking kidding me, right?" Also, another night, Max Roach got so mad at what he was hearing that he punched Coleman in the mouth at the show, then showed up in the middle of the night at his home and yelled for him to come down so he could kick his ass some more. So, what have you seen like that? Know what i mean? But I'm just repeating shit everyone already knows.

telephone call. more later

ok. so there were two double-bass players - Greg Cohen and Tony Falanga -- and his son, Denardo, on drums. Ornette played saxophone and violin for one song (he dropped it at the end and it broke) and also a trumpet briefly. He wore a black wizard suit with gold symbols all over it, shiny pointed black shoes and a plain porkpie hat. When they came out on the stage, the audience errupted and applauded and yelled out for a long time; then Ornette whispered hello and then they played and noone spoke after that.

It was tremendous. It was crazy. I couldn't stop laughing at times it was so outrageous and good. I swear, it seemed to me like they just played whatever they wanted to play, i mean, individually. Just random progressions and notes from who knows where they got them. Though, slowly you could tell they had certain phrases they'd return to. Like thin anchors in the storm. Oh yeah, and the double-bass pizzicato player, his plucking hand turned beet/beat red by the second song he was going so fast. Thinking about how it would throb made me feel sick for a while.

The songs, which I didn't know a one, were like strings of digressions or falling down stairs or like walking by turning in a new direction for every step. But it made sense if you looked at it like it was a longer thing. And it was mesmerizing. They'd seem to shift you around somehow so you'd hear each instrument just slightly featured; and it was great because the crowd would float in appreciative applause after these features, sort of like a gentle awakening. And then you'd sort of reset to the next adventure. Travelling around the stage, inside each player, until then you'd feel like you were outside the Hall, maybe back in time, or thinking of a thing you want to have happen. Transported. That's how it felt. But so random and even out of tune and sometimes I couldn't connect at all together what each player was playing. It was like different songs at the same time. Sometimes it seemed that they couldn't actually play their instruments. I mean, they were unbelievable musicians, but it came off liked they resolved to not at all pay attention to anything about scales or harmony or whatever and make like that's how they wanted music to be. Like studied savants. Still, they played at times from sheet music, so you know at least some of the chaos has order. And also, Coleman came up with a name for how and what he plays, 'Harmolodics'. So that's what I'm hearing I guess. Even though I have no idea what it means when I read the explanations of it. It's like if you decided you'd play poker by showing everyone your cards, but still you beat them. Ornette Coleman, man.

blah blah. telephone again