Charlie Haden obit

Remembering Jazz Legend Charlie Haden, Who Crafted His Voice In Bass

 

He was not on the list.

Bassist and composer Charlie Haden, whose resonant playing and penetrating melodic craft influenced generations of jazz musicians, died this morning in Los Angeles. He was 76.

Haden's death was announced by his record label, ECM Records, which noted that Ruth Cameron, his wife of 30 years, and his children Josh, Tanya, Rachel and Petra were all by his side at the time of his death, which the label attributed to a "prolonged illness."

Born August 6, 1937 in Shenandoah, Iowa, and raised largely in Springfield, Missouri, Haden grew up in a family that hosted its own country-western music radio program. He sang on air in the family band from before the age of two. At age 15, however, he contracted polio; the disease paralyzed his vocal cords, and he turned to learning bass.

In 1957, Haden moved to Los Angeles, where he integrated himself quickly into the West Coast jazz community — including working with saxophonist and composer Ornette Coleman. Their collaboration over decades, onstage and on record, not only anchored Coleman's innovations in harmony and melody, but also generated new possibilities for his own instrument in group improvisation.

His work with Coleman made him an icon of avant-garde jazz, but in a career that spanned over 50 years, Haden wrote and played in many varied contexts. His Liberation Music Orchestra, a large-ensemble collaboration with composer-arranger Carla Bley, performed and recorded political protest songs for over 30 years. His Quartet West ensemble, featuring pianist Alan Broadbent and saxophonist Ernie Watts, provided avenues for more traditional hard bop and backing vocalists. And in 2008, he revisited his country roots with an album called Rambling Boy that gathered his wife, son and triplet daughters in a new family band.

In 2012, he spoke to NPR's Rachel Martin about the connections between the music he grew up with and the music he was known for. "When you think about the art form, jazz, coming from this country and you think about the Underground Railroad and all the music that came from that struggle, and then you think about all the music coming over from Scotland and Ireland and England into the Appalachian and Ozark Mountains where I was born and raised, you know, it's all one really," he said. "We can only have been born here in this country."

As a sideman, Haden was the bassist for many of pianist Keith Jarrett's bands of the 1960s and '70s. The group Old and New Dreams reunited Coleman's sidemen, sometimes to reinterpret Coleman's compositions. He frequently performed in duet settings, which brought him into close contact with fellow jazz greats like Hank Jones, Alice Coltrane and Pat Metheny. And in 1982, he introduced jazz studies to the California Institute of the Arts, which is now one of the premier programs of its kind.

In interviews and onstage, often Haden spoke about the artist's duty to introduce beauty into a conflicted world. "That's what I tell my students at California Institute of the Arts where I teach for 27 years," he said to Martin. "I tell them if you strive to be a good person, maybe you might become a great jazz musician."

Earlier this year, Haden released his latest album, a collection of duets with Keith Jarrett. It ends with the two standards "Every Time We Say Goodbye" and "Goodbye," and is titled Last Dance.

In the late 1950s, he was an original member of the ground-breaking Ornette Coleman Quartet. In 1969, he formed his first band, the Liberation Music Orchestra, featuring arrangements by the pianist Carla Bley. In the late 1960s, he became a member of the pianist Keith Jarrett's trio, quartet and quintet. In the 1980s, he formed his own band, Quartet West. Haden also often recorded and performed in a duo setting, with musicians including the guitarist Pat Metheny and the pianists Hank Jones and Kenny Barron.

The German musicologist Joachim-Ernst Berendt wrote that Haden's "ability to create serendipitous harmonies by improvising melodic responses to Ornette Coleman's free jazz solos (rather than sticking to predetermined harmonies) was both radical and mesmerizing. His virtuosity lies (...) in an incredible ability to make the double bass 'sound out'. Haden cultivated the instrument's gravity as no one else in jazz. He is a master of simplicity which is one of the most difficult things to achieve."

Haden was born in Shenandoah, Iowa, on August 6, 1937. His family was exceptionally musical and performed on KMA radio as the Haden Family, playing country music and American folk songs. Haden made his professional debut as a singer on the Haden Family's radio show when he was just two years old. He continued singing with his family until he was fifteen, when he contracted bulbar polio. At the age of fourteen, Haden had become interested in jazz after hearing Charlie Parker and Stan Kenton in concert. Once he recovered from polio, Haden began in earnest to concentrate on playing the bass. Haden's interest in the instrument was not sparked by jazz, but the music of Johann Sebastian Bach. Haden soon set his sights on moving to Los Angeles to pursue his dream of becoming a jazz musician; to save money for the trip, he took a job as house bassist for the American Broadcasting Company TV show Ozark Jubilee in Springfield, Missouri.

Haden often said that he moved to Los Angeles in 1957 in search of pianist Hampton Hawes. He turned down a full scholarship at Oberlin College, which did not have an established jazz program at the time, to attend Westlake College of Music in Los Angeles. His first recordings were made that year with Paul Bley, with whom he worked until 1959. He also played with Art Pepper for four weeks in 1957, and with Hawes from 1958 to 1959. For a time, Haden shared an apartment with bassist Scott LaFaro.

In May 1959, Haden recorded The Shape of Jazz to Come with Ornette Coleman.