Celebrate Ornette Premium Box Set

Ornette Coleman/Song X Records – CELEBRATE ORNETTE
Celebrate Ornette is a tribute to the legendary Ornette Coleman, shot at his final concert in Brooklyn’s Prospect Park, June 2014; and at his Memorial Service one year later at Manhattan’s The Riverside Church. This box set contains two dozen original performances from some of modern music’s most iconoclastic artists, all centered on the visionary saxophonist/composer/bandleader/thinker’s incomparable legacy of music, ideas and revolutionary spirit:
MASTER MUSICIANS OF JAJOUKA, BILL LASWELL, BRANFORD MARSALIS, BRUCE HORNSBY, CECIL TAYLOR, DAVID MURRAY, FLEA, GERI ALLEN, HENRY THREADGILL, JACK DEJONETTE, JAMES BLOOD ULMER, JASON MORAN, JOE LOVANO, JOHN ZORN, KARL BERGER, LAURIE ANDERSON, NELS CLINE, PATTI SMITH, PHAROAH SANDERS, RAVI COLTRANE, SAVION GLOVER, SONNY ROLLINS, THURSTON MOORE, YOKO ONO.

CELEBRATE ORNETTE is curated by Coleman’s son and lifelong collaborator, drummer/bandleader Denardo Coleman. The PREMIUM BOX SET and The DELUXE 5 DISC GATEFOLD both comprise two DVDs, three CDs, poster, program, and a 26-page collector’s booklet with extensive liner notes by James Blood Ulmer, John Snyder, James Jordan, and Denardo Coleman.
The hand-numbered Limited Edition PREMIUM BOX SET features a from the family archive of the rarely- cover photo seen 1950’s R&B band-era Ornette with shoulder length hair and wide zoot suit shoulders. This unique edition contains a 4-volume LP set of all 24 performances from the two events, pressed on 180-gram vinyl at the legendary United Record Pressing in Nashville, Tennessee. As a special bonus, an original Ornette Coleman 10-page linen Memorial Program signed by Denardo Coleman is also included.

This historic project is a harmolodic offering of two previously unseen, profoundly personal events: the tribute concert in Brooklyn’s Prospect Park, “Celebrate Ornette,” documenting Ornette Coleman’s last appearance with his longtime drummer son’s band, DENARDO V I B E and Friends, in June 2014; coupled with Ornette’s Memorial Service, shot just one year later at Manhattan’s The Riverside Church, in which the visionary’s close artists pay moving spoken and musical tribute. Hearing harmolodics is always intense, but both these films capture the thinkers and musicians who helped develop it, and generations of their disciples, performing for their mentor in a special state of grace. CELEBRATE ORNETTE displays a profound connection; a bond made by a sound expressing ideas of liberation, that transcends style, age or race. This life-and-death duo of documentaries affirms the past and the enduring future of harmolodics — Ornette’s philosophical/musical theory that both explains and embodies the expansion of the universe.
Together, the show and the sacred ceremony bookend Ornette Coleman’s unstoppable creativity in his last year and the triumphant expansion of Harmolodics.

Directed by Denardo Coleman
Cinematography & Editing by Jon Sadlier
Recorded by Chris Agovino, Tommie Cruse
Mixed by S. Husky Hoskulds at Groundlift Studios
Mastered by Ted Jensen for Sterling Sound
Video Sound Mix by Tommie Cruse

– DVD 2014 Celebrate Ornette Concert at Prospect Park Brooklyn (3hrs)

– DVD 2015 Ornette Coleman Memorial at The Riverside Church, New York (3hrs)

– CD’s – 3 Volume, 24-track Collection of new content from both memorable events

– 26 page booklet including notes by Denardo Coleman, producer James Jordan, musician James Blood Ulmer, producer John Snyder, exclusive photographs and Ornette Coleman Poster from renowned Italian photographer Elena Carminati.

– Signed Authentic Original Linen Memorial Program

– 4 Volume 24-track Audiophile Set 180-gram vinyl pressed on 12″ LPs at 33 1/3 RPM by United Record Pressing

– 1600 Hand-numbered Limited Edition

MUSICIANS & SPEAKERS:
Ornette Coleman – alto saxophone
Geri Allen – piano & keyboards
Laurie Anderson – violin
Karl Berger – speaker
Dave Bryant – piano
Nels Cline – guitar
Denardo Coleman – drums
Ravi Coltrane – soprano & tenor saxophone
Jack DeJohnette – drums
Charlie Ellerbe – guitar
Tony Falanga – contra bass
Flea – electric bass
Savion Glover – tap
Bruce Hornsby – piano & keyboards
Bill Laswell – electric bass
Joe Lovano – tenor saxophone
Branford Marsalis – soprano & tenor saxophone
Master Musicians of Jajouka – rhaita
Al MacDowell – piccolo bass
Charnett Moffett – contra bass
Thurston Moore – guitar
Jason Moran – piano
David Murray – tenor saxophone
Bern Nix – guitar
Yoko Ono – speaker
Antoine Roney – tenor saxophone
Wallace Roney, Jr. – trumpet
Chris Rosenberg – guitar
Sonny Rollins – speaker
Pharoah Sanders – tenor saxophone
Patti Smith – vocals & clarinet
Jamaaladeen Tacuma – electric bass
Cecil Taylor – piano & vocal
Henry Threadgill – alto saxophone
James Blood Ulmer – electric guitar
Ken Wessel – electric guitar
John Zorn – alto saxophone