Jazz Recommendations

Since historical recordings have been pretty well covered, here are some recent favorites, and I listen to a lot, so these are real standouts, IMHO ;-)

Pat Martino: "Live at Yoshi's" (smoking guitar/organ combo).

Marty Ehrlich: both "Song" and "Malinke's Dance" are excellent blends of straight ahead playing and more modern leanings.

Buster Williams Quartet: "Live at the Montreux Jazz Festival" has Mulgrew Miller on piano teamed w/ Steve Nelson on vibes - groovin'.

Eddie Henderson Quintet: "Reemergence" ( A mellow glow surrounds the group and keeps the mood steady.)

Dave Holland Quintet: "Points of View" is my favorite, but "Prime Directive" and "Not for Nuthin'" are also great.

Steve Slagle: "New New York" (start-to-finish fantastic, with varied moods, textures, instrumental mixes).

Greg Osby: "Invisible Hand" with grandmasters Jim Hall and Andrew Hill, sets a haunting mellow mood throughout.

Gene Harris: Best of the Concord Years (rollicking, swinging playing that makes me want to run out and buy everything he ever recorded. Undervalued piano master!)

Chick Corea and Origin: Change (Wow, what a group. Beats the first Origin disc by a mile, by the way).

I could go on, but these keep finding their way back into the player, so start here if you want to hear some of today's best. - Dave

Here are two cd's I love Cannonball Adderley Quintet in San Fransico (OJC) includes a great version of Straight No Chaser as a bonus track and 2)Live In Swing City/ Swinign With The Duke by the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis. I imagine it's what the great Duke bands would have sounded like if they exisited in the stereo era. I heard this on Wash DC premier jazz station WPFW which is listener supported. I love jazz but am not an expert even with a substantial record collection of Blue Notes and Prestige. The folks at WPFW are though and it's highly unlikely that any serious music lover won't find something of value on this cd. Doesn't contain the hits but does have some serious moments of swing.

Not possible to add to the incredible variety above, but since the Monk blew you away, Monk "Live At The IT Club Complete" on Columbia/Legacy is phenomenal and worth a listen. Didn't see it mentioned above, if it is and I missed it, sorry for the redundancy.

I came up with the conclusion that Lounge Lizards band is one of the brightest pages in the world jazz history and current jazz and every jazz fan should get a grip on these guys. The recording quality is slightly better than average but everything has to be dedicated to music in their case.

I think Jazz topic is way too big. Way too difficult to list a must have CD list. Best way is to get some book ie. Stereophile Good Jazz CD guide, or Penguine guide, or some others. Then listend to style that you like and expand it from there.

Say you like Monk... he plays bop, post bop .. you may want to try some other album by him. Here are some of his best work (my opinion) Brilliant Corners, Thelonious with John Coltrane, Thelonious Monk and Sonny Rollins, Underground. Then you might pick those name who played with him such as John Coltrane or Sunny Rollins and goes from there ... we still in post bop, bop or hard bop ... well ..coltrane is pretty unique though.. then find something from Coltrane ie. A Love Supreme, Giant Steps, blue train. Rollins?? Saxophone Colossus. Then you may... try to see who is playing bop .. Dizzy Gillespee, Charlie Parker Now you get my point.

Once in a while you may want to jump to different style of jazz ... How about Cool, West coast, Free, Avantgarde??? Cool ... you may try Mile Davis "Kind of Blue" or Bill Evans "Sunday at village Vanguard"

In any case, you should have good book as reference. Another good book is All Music guide to Jazz. .. and one section of "Jazz Theory book"

Or www.nprjazz.org is a good site for sort of essential list.

You just have to be opened because jazz is really wide varieties of style.

These are some of my favorites that not mentioned too much in a list.

Keith Jarrette: Belonging, The Koln Concert
Don Pullen: New Beginnings or anything with George Adams
Patricia Barber: Nightclub
Rasann Kirk: Rip, Rig & Panic/Now please don't cry, beautiful Edith
Don Cherry: Art Deco

Um.. other than that ... more or less usual ... like other would probably recommend