But most of the really free jazzers in the 60s also took a step back and produced a lot more melodic stuff afterwards.
Who have you got in mind? Cecil Taylor? Anthony Braxton? Peter Brotzmann? Charles Gayle? Sunny Murray? No sign of those guys taking a step back yet. OK, Archie Shepp mainly plays and sings the blues these days and Pharoah Sanders plays modal Coltrane-isms, but a lot of those guys have stuck to their guns. The point of free jazz was that players were getting bored of the restrictive 32 bar structures of bebop and new solutions had to be found either by erasing the bar lines or finding new structures that allowed for more creative freedom.. or abandoning structure altogether - take a step into the unknown and see what happens.. once you've experienced that, it's difficult to go back to improvising over the changes to "I've Got Rhythm" - plus, playing freeform is really good fun
A couple of years ago I had the pleasure of seeing Henry Grimes, Andrew Cyrille and Paul Dunmall, they were fantastic -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=732R0I4hr6o&list=UUZapZe-y81tUXj-npjuC3LQ&index=25&feature=plcp
the headliners were Polar Bear, who were so bad I had to leave in the torrential rain rather than sit through their mediocrity - the bassist was the only one who could improvise a decent solo..
I've heard Trio VD, Troyka etc on Jazz On 3 and they're ok, but they don't seem to have a lot to say for themselves - they could stop staring at their shoes and look up to the heavens once in a while..
Once you've done the totally free, what do you do? Keep doing it, of course. People don't reject melodic playing once they've done it, no one accuses them of reaching a brick wall of melody. Music's been done, lets all pack up our instruments and admit defeat.. or we could rise to the challenge and try to express ourselves and stretch the limits of our abilities and find our own modes of expression rather than being stuck in the past. A bit of originaliy wouldn't do any harm.
The audience for free jazz and free improv is growing and there's renewed interest in the music of Sun Ra, Albert Ayler etc, particularly with the alternative rock audience, there's a whole new generation who're looking for that freedom in a world of prepackaged conformity. Ornette and Cecil play large venues and get paid well for their efforts these days, Evan Parker tours the world and headlines festivals. Long lost free jazzers from the 60's are being rediscovered and are recording again. There's a whole load of record labels and music festivals that specialise in this kind of music, magazines like The Wire devote a lot of space to writing about it. The audience may not be as large as it is for Kenny G, but size isn't everything..
Of course not all the modern jazzers are treading old ground, check out Atomic or Ken Vandermark who can write great compositions
and improvise well, they could teach Branford and Wynton a thing or two...
Anyway, I've gotta go record some free jazz sax for a guy that wants to release it, maybe we'll call it "Brick Wall Of Noise" ;}