Ornette Coleman Quartet, Royal Festival Hall, London (GB) - Jul 9, 2007

Wallen trumpet/piano, Larry Bartley double bs and Tom Skinner dms did the first bit. Numbers included Freedom Struggle and Meeting Ground. Then came another great Coleman band (actually a quintet): Ornette Coleman alto sax/trumpet/violin, Albert McDowell bs guitar, Tony Falanga double bs, Charnett Moffett double bs, Denardo Coleman drums. A wonderful, high-energy and inventive session in which the musicians collectively improvised as well as soloed, responding to each other with astonishing musicianship. The repertoire included Ornette’s Dancing in Your Head and Turnaround. Falanga, crawling all over his double bass, treated us to bits of The Rite of Spring and Bach’s 1st Cello Suite. The great Lonely Woman was the encore. Reviewed by Duncan Heining in Jazzwise 112, by John Fordham on 11 Jul 2007 in the Guardian and Keith Shadwick in the Independent of the same date.