U-Discover Mag Lists The 50 Greatest Jazz Albums

Jazzcourier, I don't know much about Jazz but my first thought was how could you leave out Tatum and include Weather Report.

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Schubert...I had to snicker and chuckle at that one myself.

Hey, someone had to make a list...and they had to start somewhere.
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I'm at 41 of 50.

My biggest quibble with the list would be the omission of Duke Ellington's "Far East Suite". Admittedly, it's more a personal favorite than an acknowledged classic, but IMHO "FES" mixes adventurous arrangements with some truly beautiful music. It's my own quirk, but that record would definitely be high on my own top 50.

There is no Dizzy or Baker, no Burrell, no Hawkins, or as gentleman previously said Tatum, and so on...never saw a list of that kind that I actually liked, and certainly one should contain at least 500 albums to take it seriously. The same is with any other type of art or list about it. Unfortunately that tipe of 'education' is not considered as 'value' in modern society, and it is left for scholars or enthusiasts to dig into, for others, and for almost everything today, we have short lists...

As Ohnwy said, any list can be nit picked to death; so, I would be careful about missing the forest for the trees. Don't know if anyone read the description of how they actually compiled this particular list; this might bring a somewhat different perspective to the table. These were the albums that received the most votes on all other available lists of its kind. Also, remember that, as has been discussed many times re this topic, "greatest" means different things to different people. Greatest is often considered to be the most influential or representative of an era, while to someone else it may mean the best executed representation (as far as the playing) of a particular era or style while not necessarily being the most influential. Case in point: "Something Else". Great record, fantastic playing....influential? Not really; very little on that great record that hadn't been done before.

While I agree that the omission of Tatum is suspect, I can understand why someone might make that decision. Tatum was actually, and incredibly, considered by some to not be a real jazz player and his very ornate playing no more than filigree; and an argument could be made that he was simply an extension of Fats Waller's stride piano style. From a pianistic standpoint his incredible virtuosity and influence cannot be argued. Re Wearher Report: unless one is prepared to dismiss the validity of the entire genre of jazz-fusion, there is no question that they deserve to be on the list. IMO.