Following the trend of experimentation that was so evident with bebop and cool jazz, jazz musicians continued to experiment with new forms and new sounds. Their experimentation evolved into several different forms of jazz including free jazz, acid jazz, and avant-garde jazz. It is hard to call this period any one particular name. In this summary I would like to talk mainly about the hard bop and free jazz styles that were part of the new things in jazz that developed from 1959 to 1970.

The hard bop style obtained its name because it was more driving and les relaxed than cool jazz. In addition hard bop was also called funky due to it's rollicking, rythmic feeling. The funky style had many ties to gospel music and during the period was often called soul. Funky was a style that utilized highly rhythmical melodies and less complex harmonies than were used during the preceding era. Musicians created a style that can be described as happy or lacking tension. Funky jazz used bop elements, but they were much simplified. The playing style of funky jazz musicians stands in strong contrast to the measured and controlled expression of cool jazz artisits. Funky jazz borrowed elements from the African American churches of the day. The scale used in funky jazz was very similar to the scale which had been used in early blues and had been refined through it's use in church music. The predominance of blues notes during this period resulted in many players actually playing pieces in minor keys. Important artists in the genre included Sonny Rollins and Cannonball Adderly.

The other style of music that developed during this period was free jazz. Free form jazz developed as a conscious effor to break away from its musical predacessors. The main difference between free jazz and what had come before was that free jazz efforts operate in a medium that is not defined by the same harmonic and rhythmic forms used by earlier jazz styles. The essence of free form jazz is that it doesn't use a strict structure for playing a piece and improvising. Rather it allows the musicians to react to one another during their performance. In a sense artists in a free jazz performance talk to one another through their instruments. With free jazz, the finished song was important, but so was the way in which it was created. Free form jazz, out of all jazz genres, proves to be the most spontaeous and thus include the most improvisation. Two very important members of the free jazz movement were John Coltrane and Ornette Coleman.