What is the appeal of free jazz? I've been told it's more a depiction of feeling and thought, beyond any kind of rhythm or melody. I can see the emotion in the music past the "unpleasant" and unorthodox way the instruments are used, but (to put it bluntly) why would someone want to listen to it ?
>>122571425Spontaneous composition, das it mane
>>122571425I used to be really into it when I smoked a lot of weed and other drugs.Here is maybe another way of thinking about it: in very generous terms (not everyone is so forgiving) free jazz is determined by solos or improvised ideas that are SO creative that you couldn't necessarily pin them down to concrete compositional ideas or music theory cocepts. If regular jazz is spontaneous, free jazz is kind of supposed to be a higher level of spontenaeous, or at least a different kind, where the association leading one idea to another is "freed" from the normal ways that typical jazz musicians conjure up ideas.This is very purely Ornette Coleman. One idea is connected to the other via just a general vibe or vague feeling, not regular harmony rules and concepts more jazz guys would use. One lick goes baddle-dup, the other goes baddle-doop. Whatever. It's free.I think it makes the music feel (especially for first time listeners) exciting, because moreso than regular jazz, you REALLY don't know how it's going to go. You don't even have an idea.Except, you kind of do. After a while you ear is trained against free jazz, and you start to hear the same feeling. Frankly, being more sober and cynical now, it feels like musicians being confidently wrong on purpose.Actually I think 99% of the late trane is just loud spiritual jazz. He had the infinite pool of harmony and melody knowledge to draw from, so it makes a lot more sense.Probably the only essential free jazz listening I have heard is Albert Ayler. If you've heard him, it's just not going to get any better. As far as I can tell you can stop there.
>>122571425Hard to articulate without sounding pretentious but it puts your mind in a state of chaos that's creatively stimulating and good for abstract thinking
>>122571658this is better as an explanation than my mega post, just think of it like this. But still hear Albert Ayler
>>122571636>>122571658very insightful, thanks a bunch !
>>122571636what about Sun Ra?
>>122571455It's not really interesting composition though, is it? It's just doing random shit all the time, it doesn't have any form.
The soul of jazz is improvisation, the centrality of which set it apart from everything that came before. It really was a total revolution, and free jazz is about fully exploring the outer space of that revolution, eschewing all the structure left that tethered jazz to everything else and trying to see what else could be done with these instruments, these sounds, these musicians.
>>122571425i will give you a simple take: just making a piece WORK.its like having straight or in jazz so in you that if you only had a rock and a stick you can make it work.theres a lot of angles, but i think this idea, from a maker and listener perspective, is useful.
Some people just enjoy listening hto ow some performers play or play together. It's not really complicated and it's also not something you need to to be listening to or even enjoy if you don't want to.
>>122572386Jazz musicians still spend countless hours practicing licks and motifs, internalizing patterns and phrases via extensive preparation that provides them with a vocabulary to draw upon during performance. It's all constructed within a framework, it's not completely spontaneous creativity, but is also a part of extensive preparation. And it's not some novel idea either, improvisation was a key aspect of classical music until the early/middle 20th century (even in recordings of standard repertoire). Improvisation is extremely overstated in jazz and in music in general.
>>122571425I don't understand, but I feel the passionhttps://youtu.be/_eH-f_J43Lo?si=0Rtxqb00HFvLhz3q
>>122571425It is the ultimate form of improvisation. It favors spontaneity + emotion and rejects structure and mathematics. I dislike it, but understand the appeal.
I think I like free jazz for the same reason I like noise music. Makes my brain feel good.
>>122572886see >>122572492
>>122571425You either get it or you don’t. Don’t know what to tell you.
>>122574016It's still improvisation. An equivalence would be language. Jazz musicians learn words (licks and motifs) to create sentences (solos). Just because they aren't random notes jumbled together (which they sometimes are in free jazz) does not mean it is not improvisation.
>>122574125My general point is just that the uniqueness and essence of improvisation is overstated, especially when it comes to jazz. Artistic freedom is a bit of an illusion.
>>122574142You're just setting stringent, arbitrary rules on the degree of improvisation in music. Some structure is necessary for music to be pleasing, or even considered music at all. If you go further out of the bounds of free jazz, or comparable improvisational music, then you are simply making noise. It sounds like struggling with the notion that you lack free will. Want to talk about it? We can cope, and possibly rope together.
I think pop and country sound to me like what free jazz sounds like to people who hate free jazz.
>>122574256Improvisation is overstated in music. I reject the idea of freedom and improvisation, it's simply not what it pretends to be.
>>122572347How would you know unless you listened to them all? High handed of you to dismiss all spontaneous compositions as uninteresting from your no doubt very limited exposure to them
>>122572854i love this movie
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZD6X_DTvdE
>>122575188I can only go off the material I've listened to and my own impression. Isn't the point of free jazz that it has no form?
Free jazz is just a broad term for freer jazz, good artists tend to be idyosincratic and fun while mediocre ones copy in a lesser way, just like in other genres.https://youtu.be/DS_30iA7oe0?si=JqYfXgqriu_2J4C_https://youtu.be/l61FRMjGSPA?si=j0N2LeazbwHL92z2
>>122571425>why would someone want to listen to it ?Why would someone go on intense roller coaster rides when they can enjoy a simple walk in the park?Why would someone want biting and spanking during sex when they can just enjoy procreative missionary style?Why would someone watch a bloody horror movie when they can just relax to a simple Disney princess flick?When you turn 18 and your brain has developed a little more, maybe then it will make sense.
There seems to be a lot of people ITT who don't understand that "free jazz" is just short for free-form or free-rhythm. The whole "spiritual experience of freedom and freedom of emotions" thing is just an aesthetic afterthought.
>>122576324You have never seen a vaginer
>>122571425well u dont have to pay for it haha
>>122571425haha saxophone go SKRONK
>>122578552You have never seen an argument
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