At this time the fashion is to bring something to jazz that I reject. They speak of freedom. But one has no right, under pretext of freeing yourself, to be illogical and incoherent by getting rid of structure and simply piling a lot of notes one on top of the other. There’s no beat anymore. You can’t keep time with your foot. I believe that what is happening to jazz with people like Ornette Coleman, for instance, is bad. There’s a new idea that consists in destroying everything and find what’s shocking and unexpected; whereas jazz must first of all tell a story that anyone can understand. —Thelonious Monk
Now, can you tell me a story? —Lester Young (after listening to a pyrotechnic display by a young hotdog saxophonist).
Looking back now, what’s not to understand about Ornette? And does anyone seriously think a tune like “Lonely Woman” doesn’t tell a compelling story?
I still enjoy Paul Desmond’s assessment of “free” jazz: “It’s like walking into a room where everything is painted red.”
Though I believe that Ornette Coleman has contributed important jazz compositions, such as “Lonely Woman” and “Turnaround,” his playing has little appeal to me. The work of Eric Dolphy is far more compelling to my ears.
In any case, even the most far out free jazz is more listenable than the caterwalling vocals of Yoko Ono…
I think Monk and Prez both were using the term “tell a story” as a metaphor for musical form in the sense that one statement leads to another in a logical succession to resemble a “story” being told. Ornette’s “Lonely Woman” more or less “paints a picture,” IMO, supplied by the listener in a more subjective reaction to the musical sound effects.