Harmolodics is a musical philosophy and method of musical composition and improvisation developed by American jazz saxophonist-composer Ornette Coleman. His work following this philosophy during the late 1970s and 1980s inspired a style of forward-thinking jazz-funk known as harmolodic funk. It is associated with avant-garde jazz and free jazz, although its implications extend beyond these limits. Coleman also used the name "Harmolodic" for both his first website and his record label.
Description Coleman defined harmolodics as "the use of the physical and the mental of one's own logic made into an expression of sound to bring about the musical sensation of unison executed by a single person or with a group". Applied to the particulars of music, this means that "harmony, melody, speed, rhythm, time and phrases all have equal position in the results that come from the placing and spacing of ideas".Coleman, Ornette. "Prime Time for Harmolodics". Down Beat, July 1983, pp. 54–55. Quoted in Gioia (1990), p. 43. (see: aspects of music)
Harmolodics seeks to free musical compositions from any tonal center, allowing harmonic progression independent of traditional European notions of tension and release (see: atonality). Harmolodics may loosely be defined as an expression of music in which harmony, movement of sound, and melody all share the same value. The general effect is that music achieves an immediately open expression, without being constrained by tonal limitations, rhythmic pre-determination, or harmonic rules.
Ronald Radano suggests that Coleman's concepts of harmonic unison and harmolodics were influenced by Pierre Boulez's theory of aleatory while Gunther Schuller suggested that harmolodics is based on the superimposition of the same or similar phrases, thus creating polytonality and heterophony.Ronald M. Radano (1994). New Musical Figurations: Anthony Braxton's Cultural Critique, pp. 109, 109–110n97. .
Coleman had been preparing a book called The Harmolodic Theory since at least the 1970s, but this remains unpublished. The only other known explanation of harmolodics that was written by Coleman is a DownBeat article called "Prime Time for Harmolodics" (1983).
Proponents include James Blood Ulmer and Jamaaladeen Tacuma.Gioia, Ted (1990). The Imperfect Art: Reflections on Jazz and Modern Culture, p. 43. . Ulmer, who played and toured with Coleman during the 1970s, has adopted harmolodics and applied the theories to his approach to jazz and blues guitar (for example, Harmolodic Guitar with Strings).
Record label
In 1995, Coleman and his son, Denardo, established the Harmolodic record label, which had a marketing and distribution arrangement with Verve/PolyGram. The label released its first album, Coleman's Tone Dialing, in September 1995. Harmolodic went on to release new albums by Coleman and Jayne Cortez, and also reissued some of Coleman's previous albums. The label was based in Harlem, New York.
Discography + Discography Catalog number Artist Title Year5274832 and Prime TimeTone Dialing19955316572Sound Museum: Three Women19965319142 Sound Museum: Hidden Man19965319162Body Meta (reissue)19965319172 Soapsuds, Soapsuds (reissue)19965319182Taking the Blues Back Home19965377892 and Joachim KühnColors: Live from Leipzig19975319152In All Languages (reissue)1997
See also Avant-funk List of record labels
References
External links