"hard bop" jazz heads....

Phase, this is a subject I can relate to. Some of the work by the artists I have listed below fall into hard bop category. ALL of these artists have important things to say, but then again, I am a Jazz fan.

Cannonball Adderley
Art Blakey
Clifford Brown
Donald Byrd
John Coltrane
Miles Davis
Lou Donaldson
Bill Evans
Grant Green
Herbie Hancock
Joe Henderson
Freddie Hubbard
Jackie McLean
Hank Mobley
Thelonious Monk
Wes Montgomery
Lee Morgan
Sonny Rollins
Wayne Shorter
Horace Silver

Top Albums, (in my opinion)

A Blowin' Session, Johnny Griffin
Afro-Cuban, Kenny Dorham
Blue Train, John Coltrane
Blues Walk, Lou Donaldson
Brilliant Corners, Thelonious Monk
Byrd in Flight, Donald Byrd
Cookin, Miles Davis
East Broadway Rundown, Sonny Rollins

Much of this is re released on LP (if you like vinyl) if your a CD guy, I'll bet you can find most at Borders.

I'm not a real fan of a lot of jazz/blues.

For example, I have a Patricia Barber cd, a Diane Krall cd, Miles Davis' Kind of Blue, et al, but I still don't get it.

However, lately I've stumbled across and been getting a lot of pleasure from listening to some well-recorded big band jazz on a few Telarc sampler cds.

-IMO

Just formulated a list based on "Hard Bop" from memory and what I could see (in the dark) in my LP collection.

I have all four of the excellent musicians you mention. Not as much Roland Kirk but enough Tina Brooks, Bud Powell and Charles Mingus to play non stop for days. I am especially proud of my Mosiac numbered edition sets that are now out of print. Not only is the music exquisite, the images are timeless snippets of that era that I overlooked in my childhood.