Joe Harriot - Free Form (1960)

 Joe Harriot - Free Form

(Jazzland JLP 49, 1960) [FLAC]

free jazz, avant-garde jazz

          A milestone not in free jazz alone but a revolution in everything in what we thought we knew about jazz. Harriot's album Free Form, is often overlooked and left by the wayside with most jazz listeners. Often compared to the infamous Free Jazz, by the great Ornette Coleman. Both of which these works were the foundations of free jazz as we know it today. There are some minor differences with the two works. Ornette took a rather belligerent take with his album (hereby setting the standard of most free jazz to come), whereas Harriot went for a more conventional approach and laid back in prospective to most free jazz after it.

          Free-form jazz, as Harriot nicked it. Was jazz music unlike any other, without a fixed harmony, nor rhythm, and by breaking the conventional limits of mode and interval. That his music would create these impressions of melody and lyricism, without actually exercising them physically. As said above, Ornette’s legacy would become what we see as free jazz. Unlike Ornette, Harriot still had finesse ties back to conventional jazz music. The press was ambivalent to what Harriot was doing during the 60s. Harriot himself would impede his band--only allowing himself to play conventional pieces when he played in public appearances. Although the front line of instruments: the alto, the trumpet, et al, were as free as what free is. The rhythm section however was rather lacking in the freedom that the front line had; there is a discernible beat in how the drum plays throughout each of the pieces. 
  

Personnel:
Joe Harriott - alto
Shake Keane - trumpet and flugelhorn
Pat Smythe - piano
Coleridge Goode - bass
Phil Seamen - drums

Tracks:
01. Formation (Harriott) [6:14]
02. Coda (Harriott) [8:00]
03. Abstract (Harriott) [3:40]
04. Impression (Harriott) [5:33]
05. Parallel (Harriott) [5:42]
06. Straight Lines (Harriott) [5:58]
07. Calypso (Harriott) [4:44]
08. Tempo (Harriott) [6:23]

Label:
Jazzland JLP 49, 1960

Download link:
new link
:)