"For the followers of Ornette Coleman’s music, 1963 and 1964 were the lost years. His final session for Atlantic Records, Ornette on Tenor, was in March 1961, and though he played sporadic club dates in ’62, his self-produced Town Hall concert in December was to be his last significant appearance until he accepted a Village Vanguard gig in January 1965. The reasons for this hiatus, apparently, were personal, economic, philosophical, pragmatic, and artistic, all at the same time to varying degrees. But it would be wrong to assume that this was an idle or unproductive period in his life – in fact, to place into context the music he made on his return, and specifically this eloquent recording from Stockholm, it’s necessary to consider some of the factors that affected the changes in his music.

One such vivid change relates directly to Coleman’s collaborators, and the trio format which he embraced initially in late ’62, in large part due to the unavailability of his previous partners. His trumpet alter-ego, Don Cherry, spent those three years in intense explorations with Sonny Rollins, the New York Contemporary Five, and Albert Ayler. Bobby Bradford, Ornette’s other brassman of choice, stayed in California where jobs were more frequent. Bassist Scott La Faro, who had joined Ornette for the Double Quartet’s Free Jazz in December 1960 and the first of the quartet sessions in 1961, continued to work with pianist Bill Evans until his fatal car crash in July, and his replacement, Jimmy Garrison, had an emotionally tinged musical disagreement with Ornette onstage at the Five Spot and chose instead to break new ground with John Coltrane. (Charlie Haden was plagued by personal demons during much of this time, living in California.) Job insecurity also induced Billy Higgins and Ed Blackwell to look elsewhere. Thus the classically-trained bassist David Izenzon and Coleman’s Ft. Worth high school drummer Charles Moffett remained from the quartet that originated early in ’62.

These performances from the Golden Circle capture this multifaceted, innovative trio at a creative peak, a time when Ornette was finding new sources of inspiration and new modes of expression." - Art Lange