Charlie Haden

Charlie Haden, a widely revered and innovative bassist, first rose to prominence in the closing years of the 1950s as one of the originators of free jazz. Although he refrained from locking himself into any single jazz subgenre, he participated extensively in harmonically abrasive projects, joining saxophonist Ornette Coleman for the landmark 1959 album The Shape of Jazz to Come and the 1961 release This Is Our Music. He likewise pursued avant-garde directions, most notably on the 1970 album Liberation Music Orchestra and in collaborations with Roswell Rudd, Archie Shepp, Alice Coltrane, and other leading figures. Even so, consonance remained his prevailing inclination. That preference surfaced clearly on the 1970s duet recordings Closeness and Golden Number as well as on projects alongside pianist Keith Jarrett, guitarist Egberto Gismonti, drummer Paul Motian, and additional partners. Haden’s deeply melodic and harmonically straightforward approach drew equally from American folk sources and from jazz itself. A soulful restraint marked his playing; he consistently favored one note—or none—over two. Though less overtly virtuosic than Scott LaFaro, another Coleman collaborator, Haden possessed comparable depth of tone and expressive force. Instead of emphasizing velocity or technical display, he quietly examined the timbral range of his instrument with assured technique and attentive listening.

Haden entered the world in 1937 into a musically active household. His relatives performed as a self-contained country-and-western ensemble comparable to the Carter Family, with whom they maintained close ties. The group appeared at revival meetings and county fairs throughout the Midwest and, during the late 1930s, broadcast its own radio program twice daily from a 50,000-watt station in Shenandoah, Iowa, the town of Haden’s birth. He made his first appearance on the family broadcast at the age of twenty-two months when his mother heard him singing along to her lullabies. The family later relocated to Springfield, Missouri, where they launched another program. Haden continued singing with the ensemble until polio struck him at age fifteen, damaging the nerves in his face and throat and thereby terminating his vocal career. In 1955 he performed on bass for a network television program produced in Springfield and hosted by country singer Red Foley. After moving to Los Angeles, Haden began playing jazz by 1957 with pianists Elmo Hope and Hampton Hawes as well as saxophonist Art Pepper.

From 1957 onward he maintained a long-running association with pianist Paul Bley at the Hillcrest Club. Around the same period Haden first encountered Ornette Coleman when the saxophonist sat in with Gerry Mulligan’s group at another Los Angeles venue. Coleman was promptly asked to leave the stage, yet Haden found the music compelling. The two musicians formed a friendship and creative alliance that soon brought Coleman and trumpeter Don Cherry into Bley’s Hillcrest ensemble in 1958. In 1959 Haden relocated to New York alongside Coleman; that year Coleman’s quartet, completed by Haden, Cherry, and drummer Billy Higgins, completed a landmark engagement at the Five Spot and commenced recording a sequence of influential albums that included The Shape of Jazz to Come and Change of the Century. Beyond his work with Coleman, Haden appeared during the 1960s with pianist Denny Zeitlin, saxophonist Archie Shepp, and trombonist Roswell Rudd. He assembled his own large ensemble, the Liberation Music Orchestra, an organization devoted to progressive political themes, and the group issued its celebrated self-titled debut for Impulse! in 1969.

In 1976 Haden united with former Coleman associates Cherry, Dewey Redman, and Ed Blackwell to establish Old and New Dreams. That same year he recorded a collection of duets with Hawes, Coleman, Shepp, and Cherry that appeared as The Golden Number on A&M. A reconstituted Liberation Music Orchestra delivered The Ballad of the Fallen on ECM in 1982. During the 1980s Haden helped establish a university-level jazz curriculum at CalArts and maintained an active schedule both as leader and sideman. In the 1990s his principal group became the bop-centered Quartet West featuring tenor saxophonist Ernie Watts, pianist Alan Broadbent, and drummer Larance Marable. He also reconvened the Liberation Music Orchestra for select performances.

Haden rejoined Coleman for a concert at the 2000 Bell Atlantic Jazz Festival in New York City. Throughout the following decade he remained highly productive, teaming with Gonzalo Rubalcaba for Nocturne and with Egberto Gismonti for In Montreal in 2001, then working with Brad Mehldau, Michael Brecker, and Brian Blade on the 2002 album American Dreams and with John Taylor on 2004’s Nightfall. Also in 2004 he returned to Montreal for the Joe Henderson tribute The Montreal Tapes alongside Henderson and Joe Foster and recorded Land of the Sun once more with Rubalcaba. The Liberation Music Orchestra reassembled for the 2005 release Not in Our Name, arranged and conducted by Carla Bley, while Haden marked his seventieth birthday with Heartplay, a duo session with guitarist Antonio Forcione. The 1988 recording Helium Tears, made with Jerry Granelli, Robben Ford, and Ralph Towner, finally appeared in 2006.

In 2008 Haden explored his country-music origins on the Decca album Family and Friends: Rambling Boy. Late that year the track “Is That America (Katrina 2005)” from the album received a Grammy nomination for Best Country Instrumental Performance. In 2009 he featured prominently on pianist Laurence Hobgood’s When the Heart Dances, which also included vocalist Kurt Elling. He returned in 2010 with Jasmine, a duo recording with pianist Keith Jarrett made for a documentary about his life. In 2011 Haden revisited his long-running Quartet West project with Sophisticated Ladies and appeared on the ECM album Live at Birdland, recorded in 2009, alongside saxophonist Lee Konitz, pianist Brad Mehldau, and drummer Paul Motian.

At the start of 2012 Haden again looked backward. Come Sunday, issued by Verve, served as a long-delayed sequel to his earlier duo album with pianist Hank Jones, the 1995 release Steal Away; the new sessions had taken place in 2010. Like its predecessor, Come Sunday consisted of spirituals and traditional material. The album’s appearance carried a note of sadness, however, because Jones died only three months after the recording dates. Haden’s own health deteriorated through the 2010s as he contended with post-polio syndrome, which left him physically weakened and ultimately prevented further performances and studio work. He passed away in Los Angeles in July 2014 at the age of seventy-six. That September Impulse! released the recording of his 1990 Montreal Jazz Festival duet with guitarist Jim Hall.

In 2016 Impulse! issued Time/Life (Song for the Whales and Other Beings) by the Liberation Music Orchestra. Issued in Haden’s memory, the album combined a 2011 live performance given by the bassist and the ensemble in Belgium with three new studio tracks recorded after his death, all featuring arrangements by pianist and longtime collaborator Carla Bley and bassist Steve Swallow. An archival release, Long Ago and Far Away with pianist Mehldau, appeared in 2018 and documented a 2007 duo concert at the Enjoy Jazz Festival in Mannheim, Germany.