Ohio Spiritual & Free Jazz
Spiritual and free jazz from Ohio — small-label fire, cut far from New York.
What you're really asking
You're asking about a regional strand of spiritual and free jazz with Ohio at its centre: self-released, communal and often political, made by players who built their own labels rather than wait for a New York deal.
The records range from meditative to ecstatic.
Where it sits
Through the late sixties and seventies, Ohio cities produced a remarkable run of spiritual and free jazz. Groups like the Black Unity Trio in Cleveland and the Pyramids, formed by students at Antioch College in Yellow Springs, pressed their own records.
Players including Abdul Wadud, Stanley Cowell and Dave Burrell carried the regional connection into the wider avant-garde.
The scene
Who: the Black Unity Trio, the Pyramids, Abdul Wadud, Stanley Cowell, Dave Burrell and the players around them. Where: Cleveland, Yellow Springs and the Ohio college circuit.
What: spiritual and free jazz, often self-released, communal and political. How a record gets in: it belongs to this Ohio network, not any spiritual jazz record.
The leading records
Oddballs
Keep digging
- Start with the self-released Ohio records
- The Pyramids and Antioch College
- Abdul Wadud and the cello in free jazz
- From Ohio into the wider avant-garde