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Ornette! is the seventh album by alto saxophonist and composer Ornette Coleman, released on Atlantic Records in 1962, his fifth for the label. The album features Scott LaFaro in place of Charlie Haden, who had left the Quartet but would work again with Coleman in the future.

The recording session took place on January 31, 1961, at Atlantic Studios in New York City. Three outtakes from the session, “Proof Readers,” “Check Up,” and “The Alchemy of Scott LaFaro” would later appear respectively on the 1993 box set Beauty Is A Rare Thing, and on 1970s compilations Twins and The Art of the Improvisers.

The titles of the compositions are initialisms derived from works by Sigmund Freud: Wit and its Relation to the Unconscious, Totem and Taboo, Civilization and its Discontents, and the essay Relation of the Poet to Day Dreaming (Wikipedia).

AllMusic Review by Brian Olewnick:
Recorded a little over a month after his groundbreaking work Free Jazz, this album found Coleman perhaps retrenching from that idea conceptually, but nonetheless plumbing his quartet music to ever greater heights of richness and creativity. Ornette! was the first time bassist Scott LaFaro recorded with Coleman, and the difference in approach between LaFaro and Charlie Haden is apparent from the opening notes of “W.R.U.” There is a more direct propulsion and limberness to his playing, and he can be heard driving Coleman and Don Cherry actively and more aggressively than Haden’s warm, languid phrasing. The cuts, with titles derived from the works of Sigmund Freud, are all gems and serve as wonderful launching pads for the musicians’ improvisations. Coleman, by this time, was very comfortable in extended pieces, and he and his partners have no trouble filling in the time, never coming close to running out of ideas. Special mention should be made of Ed Blackwell, with one of his finest performances. Ornette! is a superb release and a must for all fans of Coleman and creative improvised music in general (http://www.allmusic.com/album/ornette-mw0000325438).

Track listing:
All compositions by Ornette Coleman.
Side one[edit]
No. Title Length
1. “W.R.U.” 16:25
2. “T. & T.” 4:35
Side two[edit]
No. Title Length
1. “C. & D.” 13:10
2. “R.P.D.D.”

Personnel:
Ornette Coleman — alto saxophone
Don Cherry — pocket trumpet
Scott LaFaro — bass
Ed Blackwell — drums

Released: February 1962
Recorded: January 31, 1961
Length: 43:49
Label: Atlantic 1378