Charlie Haden

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Charlie Haden, Pescara Italy 1990
Charlie Haden, Pescara Italy 1990

Charles Edward Haden (born August 6, 1937) is a jazz double bassist, probably best known for his long association with saxophonist Ornette Coleman. Haden is also known for his signature lyrical bass lines and is one of the most respected jazz bassists and jazz composers today.

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[edit] Biography

Haden was born in Shenandoah, Iowa, and raised in a musical family, which often performed together on the radio playing country music and American folk songs. Haden made his professional debut as a singer when he was two years old, and continued singing with his family until he contracted a mild form of polio when he was 15. The polio damaged his throat muscles and vocal cords, and as a result, Haden was unable to control his pitch while singing. A few years before contracting polio, Haden had become interested in jazz, and began playing his older brother's double bass.

Haden moved to Los Angeles in 1957, and quickly began playing professionally, including stints with pianist Hampton Hawes and saxophonist Art Pepper.

Haden became famous playing with Ornette Coleman in the late 1950s, perhaps culminating with The Shape of Jazz to Come. This album was released to much controversy at the time, and Haden himself remarked that the harmolodic style of playing was so confusing to him at first that he resigned himself to repeating Coleman's lines on the bass. It was only later that he had enough confidence to start playing his own lines during the performances.

Besides his association with Ornette Coleman, Haden was also a member of Keith Jarrett's trio and "American quartet" from 1967 to 1976 with Paul Motian and Dewey Redman. He played in the collective Old and New Dreams.

He went on to lead the Liberation Music Orchestra in the 1970s. Largely arranged by Carla Bley, their music was very experimental, exploring the realms of free jazz and political music at the same time; specifically, the LMO's first album focused on the Spanish Civil War. The LMO bands have had a shifting membership comprising a "who's who" of jazz instrumentalists. Through Carla Bley's arranging, they have concentrated on a wide palette of brass instruments, including tuba, French horn, and trombone, in addition to the more standard trumpet and reed section. The Liberation Music Orchestra's 1982 album "The Ballad of the Fallen" commented again on the Spanish Civil War as well as the political instability and US involvement in Latin America. In 1990 the orchestra returned with "Dream Keeper," a more heterogeneous album which drew on American gospel and South African music to comment on politics in Latin America and apartheid in South Africa. The album featured choral contributions from the Oakland Youth Chorus.

In 1971, while on tour in Portugal, Haden decided to dedicate a performance of his song "Song for Che" to the anticolonialist revolutionaries in the Portuguese colonies of Mozambique, Angola, and Guinea-Bissau. The following day, he was detained at the Lisbon airport, jailed, and interrogated by the DGS (the Portuguese secret police). He was promptly released the same day after the intervention of the American cultural attaché, though he was later interviewed by the FBI in the United States about his choice of dedication.

This thematic exploration of genres of music not typically considered to be a jazz standard became one of Haden's signature approaches with his Quartet West. Started in 1987, the Charlie Haden Quartet West consisted of Ernie Watts on sax, Alan Broadbent on piano and Larance Marable on drums. This group featured lush, romantic arrangements by Broadbent, often with strings, and was the recipient of many awards.

Haden has also been active over the years working in duets, with pianists such as Hank Jones, Kenny Barron and Denny Zeitlin. He has explored spiritual hymns with Jones, American folk music in American Hymns, film noir music in Always Say Goodbye, and Cuban folk music in Nocturne.

In 1989, Haden was featured at the Montreal Jazz Festival, and performed in concert every night of the festival, with different combos and bands. Each of these events was recorded, and most have been released in the series "The Montreal Tapes."

In the late 1997 he collaborated on a duet with Pat Metheny on the guitar, exploring the music that influenced them in their childhood experiences in Missouri with what they call Americana music. This collaboration culminated in the album Beyond the Missouri Sky (Short Stories) and their worldwide tours together.

In 2005, Haden reconvened his Liberation Music Orchestra, with largely new members, for a new album, released Verve Records, called Not In Our Name. The album dealt primarily with the contemporary political situation in the United States, and was the first appearance of the orchestra since 1990's "Dream Keeper."

2007 sees not only his 70th birthday but also the release of the feature length documentary "Charlie Haden".

[edit] Family

His son Josh Haden is a bass guitarist and singer. He recorded with 1980's punk band Trecherous Jaywalkers (who recorded for SST Records), and is presently a member of Spain. His triplet daughters, Petra, Tanya and Rachel Haden, are all musicians. Formerly of that dog., Petra was a member of progressive folk group The Decemberists, Rachel was a founding member of rock band, The Rentals, and Tanya is married to actor Jack Black.

[edit] Selected discography

[edit] External links

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