Can you recommend Jazz for some one that doesn't like Jazz?


Let me explain, I have tried to like jazz for over 30 years. I rarely find something I like. To me it sounds too disjointed, like everyone is trying to out do the others and they are all playing a different song. I know there has to be some good instrumental smooth jazz artists I am missing. If you have any suggestions of whom to try let me know. Some that are on my Jazz playlist is Pat Metheny-"It's for you"   Bill Frisell _"Heard it through the grapevine"  Holly Cole, George Benson... for an example of things I do like.

 

I'd love to have a 100 song Jazz playlist. So what'ch got for me?

Thanks

128x128fthompson251

@OP Chet Baker, Paul Desmond. And though some people hate CTI recordings, a lot of Wes Montgomery's CTI recordings are very listenable. And speaking of Wes Montgomery, Lee Ritenour's Wes Bound is an outstanding recording - in the quality of its engineering and musicianship.

I am exactly like you.  I’ve tried for decades to like jazz.  It just doesn’t grab me much at all.  However, I have one recording I could gladly listen to again and again.  It’s the only jazz record I can say that about and I have a small collection of recordings by very well known jazz artists.

I came across this recording thanks to Michael Fremer.  He was invited to speak at our Audiophile Foundation and he talked about this recording.  I decided that if Michael Fremer recommended it I would buy it.  I have a perfectly good turntable and a relatively large vinyl collection, but I don’t buy LPs any more as I’m hooked on streaming my own large CD collection.  I made an exception and I am very very glad I did.

the recording  is named “Rufus Reid and Caellan Cardello.  It’s just a piano and a double bass.

The recording was done in a small performance space in NYC and billed as “New Directions in Jazz Piano”

I subscribe to Qobuz and Tidal using Roon and if I wanted to listen to jazz, from Roon I would go into Genres, then it gives you 20-30 options of what kind of jazz you want to listen to: contemporary, fusion, soul jazz, smooth jazz and many more. Subscribing to Qobuz/Tidal allows you to you to listen to millions of tracks in each genre without ever buying anything

Start with Miles Davis Kind of Blue. Listen to the whole album every day for a month.

Jeez, not a lot of love for the "classics" here. ;-)

I'm a big-band and swing guy myself, but I enjoy a lot of "modern" jazz that is tuneful and swings.  Here are what are considered some pretty classic albums and some of my favorites:

Dave Brubeck - Time Out

Jimmy Giuffre - The Jimmy Giuffre 3

John Lewis - Grand Encounter

Charles Mingus - Blues & Roots

Duke Ellington - The Great Paris Concert

Rahsaan Roland Kirk - I Talk With the Spirits

Stan Getz and Jimmy Rowles - The Peacocks

Bill Evans - Sunday at the Village Vanguard

Ben Webster - At the Renaissance

Oscar Peterson - Girl Talk (Exclusively for My Friends)

Gerry Mulligan Meets Ben Webster

Sarah Vaughn - Sarah Vaughn (with Clifford Brown, 1954)

Dinah Washington - Dinah Jams

Billie Holiday - Recital (Verve, 1952)

That's just off the top of my head.