Cat No 69272

The Ornette Coleman Quintet with Don Cherry, Paul Bley, Charlie Haden & Billy Higgins - live at the Hillcrest Club, Los Angeles, October 1958. Gambit present the complete performance on a single CD for the first time, with 4 tracks appearing on CD for the very first time.

Just as the famous 1940-41 Jerry Newman recordings at Minton’s and Clark Monroe’s Uptown House captured the transition from swing to bebop, the music on this CD marks one of the first steps from bebop into what would soon be called “free jazz”. The whole quintet consisted of modern players aiming for a freer way of playing jazz, transcending the strict confines of melody, harmony and rhythm. They would create a whole new idiom.

These concerts are the only known recorded works of Paul Bley with Ornette Coleman, Don Cherry or Billy Higgins, both separately and as a unit. There is also a rare example of Ornette recording someone else’s material : Charlie Parker’s “Klactoveesedstene”. The quintet heard on these historic Hillcrest recordings shows a highly creative level, and transmits a contagious excitement based on their search for new musical ideas. This music is as impressive today as it was when it was first performed nearly fifty years ago.