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Coleman was raised in Fort Worth, Texas,where he began performing R&B and bebop initially on tenor saxophone. He later switched to alto, which has remained his primary instrument. Coleman's timbre is perhaps one of the most easily recognized in jazz: his keening, crying sound draws heavily on blues music.
Coleman moved to Los Angeles in the early 1950s. He worked at various jobs, including as an elevatorAn elevator is a transportation device used to move goods or people vertically. In British English and other Commonwealth Englishes, elevators are known more commonly as lifts although the word elevator is familiar from American movies and television show operator, while pursuing his musical career. Coleman's music and playing were in many ways, even from the beginning of his career, rather unorthodox: Coleman was more concerned with relative pitchThe term relative pitch may denote: the distance of a musical note from a set point of reference, e. three octaves above middle C" a musician's ability to identify the intervals between given tones, regardless of their relation to concert pitch (A 440Hz) than "proper" equal temperamentEqual temperament is a scheme of musical tuning in which the octave is divided into a series of equal steps (equal frequency ratios). The best known example of such a system is twelve t one e qual t emperament sometimes abbreviated to 12-TET which is nowa; his sense of harmonyThis article is about musical harmony. For other uses of the term, see Harmony (disambiguation) . Harmony is the art of using pitch simultaneity (or chords, actual or implied) in music. It is sometimes referred to as the "vertical" aspect of music, with m and chord progressionA chord progression as its name implies, is a series of chords played in an order. Part and parcel of this action is the idea that the chords relate to each other in some way, whether closely or distantly, and they as a whole become an entity in themselve are not as rigid as most swing music or bebop performers', and was easily changed and often implied. Many Los Angeles jazz musicians regarded Coleman's playing as out-of-tune, and he sometimes had difficulty finding like-minded musicians with whom to perform. Pianist Paul Bley was an early supporter.
In 1958 Coleman led his first recording session for Something Else! The Music of Ornette Coleman. The session also featured trumpeter Don Cherry, drummer Billy Higgins, bassist Don Payne and Walter Norris on piano. Norris was sympathetic to Coleman's ideas, but has been criticised for not quite grasping them (though, in fairness, it must be noted that few grasped Coleman's ideas this early on), and further, a piano tied Coleman to equal temperament; consequently, this album is often regarded as something of a false start for Coleman.