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Ornette Coleman’s decision to feature his ten-year-old son Denardo on drums for his 1966 album The Empty Foxhole throws a splendid monkey wrench to the machines of avant-garde music. We all know the popular cliché about abstract art — that “my kid could paint that” — and indeed, when Coleman played the album for the great trumpeter Freddie Hubbard, Hubbard thought it sounded like a little kid fooling around.

On one level, it’s a troll. Could the only difference between avant-garde music and the blind thrashings of a little kid be the prestigious Blue Note Records stamp on the cover? Could a less discerning ear than a musician’s tell the difference between incompetence and deconstruction? I, for one, stumbled across The Empty Foxhole while perusing music late at night on Spotify. Intrigued by the cryptic title, I put it on and thought it worked fine as free jazz before I found out about the complex backstory.

But it goes deeper than that. Ornette Coleman had bought Denardo a drum kit for his sixth birthday, and by the time the Empty Foxhole sessions started the kid had been playing for four years — longer than Coleman had been playing two of the instruments he plays here, violin and trumpet. Only bassist Charlie Haden had a reasonable amount of experience with his chosen instrument, and often he’s the motor driving the music forward, his bass forming geometric lattices between the freeform father-son thrashing.

Does the kid actually know what he’s doing? Is it a prerequisite for avant-garde to know how to play their instruments in a conventional manner before going off the rails? Still to this day Picasso fans point out his earlier, more respectable paintings as proof that he really could paint and wasn’t just “talentless.” But that’s not what Picasso is famous for. Lil B can spit with the best of them, but he doesn’t and prefers to slur about what celebrities he looks like, and he’s so much more interesting doing so.

Is there avant-garde intent behind what the kid is doing? He thrashes, slops around, hits cymbals and toms with wanton abandon, generally sounds like a kid delighted to have a turn on the drums. Did the kid just not practice very much? Did Coleman command him to let loose? Is Coleman bullshitting? Either way, he doesn’t sound like he’s been playing for four years; a simple YouTube search will yield dozens of drummers Denardo’s age, all with fearsome chops.

Maybe Coleman just likes the guileless sound only a kid can provide. After all, why hire some guy who’s spent years learning how to sound like a kid when the real thing’s right there, presumably free of charge? This album brings up a million questions. But maybe the most fascinating thing about The Empty Foxhole is it’s pretty good — a quick, easygoing trio album that’s fleeter and more fun than so much free jazz. It’s a treat to listen to, then it gets you thinking. Isn’t that what a good album is supposed to do?

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