ORNETTE COLEMAN
Genres: Avant-Garde Jazz, Eclectic Fusion, Third Stream, Post Bop, Jazz Related Soundtracks, Hard Bop • United States

Randolph Denard Ornette Coleman (March 9, 1930 – June 11, 2015) was an American jazz saxophonist, violinist, trumpeter and composer. He was one of the major innovators of the free jazz movement of the 1960s, a term he invented with the name of an album. Coleman's timbre was easily recognized: his keening, crying sound drew heavily on blues music. His album Sound Grammar received the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for music. Coleman was born in 1930 in Fort Worth, Texas, where he was also raised. He attended I.M. Terrell High School, where he participated in band until he was dismissed for improvising during "The Washington Post." He began performing R&B and bebop initially on tenor saxophone, and started a band, the Jam Jivers, with some fellow students including Prince Lasha and Charles Moffett. Seeking a way to work his way out of his home town, he took a job in 1949 with read more...