Suggest a Jazz music CD

[Rocker]

Anyone care to suggest a jazz music CD. I have some of the usual suspects: Dave Brubeck Quartet, No 1 Jazz Album, Kind of Blue and a few others. I mainly listen to Rock and Blues but a change now and then is no bad thing.

Thanks.

[Ivor]

if you can take a recommendation for someone who isn't really a jazz fan (but seems to have an ever increasing number of jazz recordings in his collection) you might try this little gem.



It's beautifully recorded, beautifully played and while quite immediate it's not particularly commercial or poppy either. It's also about €7.99.

[Gussy Finknottle]

You got to have a listen to Weather Report or Jaco Pastorius, Jazz Fusion

[Seán]

Anyone care to suggest a jazz music CD. I have some of the usual suspects: Dave Brubeck Quartet, No 1 Jazz Album, Kind of Blue and a few others. I mainly listen to Rock and Blues but a change now and then is no bad thing.

Thanks.

Hi Tom,

1) If you don't already have any big band recordings you might like to try the Duke Ellington recording of his Shakespearean Suite, 'Such Sweet Thunder':


2) or (by my reckoning) his last great recording, the 'New Orleans Suite':


3) As you like rock you might like the Pat Metheny group, when I played this for Noel Cloney in 1978 he ran out and bought a copy of it:


4) or the Gary Burton group this is really great stuff:


5) now here is a man you won't here about around here: Yusef Lateef (aka Bill Evans before he converted to Islam), anyway this is a gorgeous live recording in the Keystone Korner, it's entitled, '10 Years Hence':


6) Roland Kirk's album and again this is from the Keystone Korner in San Francisco these last two offerings have the great energy and verve of live recordings:


7) and back to what may appeal to 'rock heads' this recording is from 1978, it was a hi-fi buff's dream recording in the late seventies, it's really good music too: Neil Ardley's, 'Kaleidoscope of Rainbows':


If you don't fancy any of the above let me know....I can suggest many, many more to you. I assume that you have considered and already have or you have entirely dismissed the idea of getting Miles Davis, 'Bitches Brew':


Happy listening.

[mick]

If you are coming from a rock perspective the band 'NOMO' might be a good place to start.

http://listen.grooveshark.com/#/search/ ... query=nomo

http://www.cdwow.ie/home/nomo-new-tones ... 15#bc=7139

These links will help find them.

[mcq]

Some very good recommendations already but I have to mention the following as well.

Miles Davis's Jack Johnson is, in my opinion, his purest album in the rock vein. It's a refinement and development of the music of In A Silent Way and Bitches Brew but is much more stripped down and muscular in its approach. Not a note is wasted and Miles is on some of his greatest form as a soloist (his solo on Right Off is exceptional). Two long tracks full of intensity and vibrancy that just have to be heard. Wonderful guitar playing from John McLaughlin and Sonny Sharrock as well.

Here's Right Off:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DEBKksupBVA (Part 1)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rcFiA-Ny ... re=related (Part 2)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TTJpPnX2 ... re=related (Part 3)

Keith Jarrett's Belonging remains a career high for the man and is also one of the finest albums of the Seventies (some of Jan Garbarek's best work on record as well). Resolutely all-acoustic at a time when fusion was all the rage, this wonderful album has an infectious gospel-fuelled intensity that makes it hard to resist.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EXpPlBFGG_Q (Long As You Know You're Living Yours)

Grant Green was one of jazz's greatest guitarists (before he wasted his talent with fusion in the Seventies) and Idle Moments is his masterpiece. Glorious playing that comes straight from the heart.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mbEwVrDmlxk (Title track)

Sonny Rollins' Saxophone Colossus is one of the great jazz masterpieces. Big-boned and full of life, this is music-making that will leave you with a smile on your face. Immaculate work from the great Max Roach on drums as well.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ox5MUXvh ... re=related (Moritat or, alternatively, the greatest version of Mack the Knife ever)

I have to mention Bill Evans as well. Although Waltz for Debby is probably his greatest work, his duo session with guitarist Jim Hall, Undercurrent, is another masterpiece of understated emotion.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_KRbQrEs ... 1&index=39 (My Funny Valentine)

Another of my favourites is alto saxophonist Art Pepper's album with strings, Winter Moon. Although I am generally no great fan of jazz musicians working with orchestras, this is one of the best examples (along with Stan Getz's immortal Focus) of how it should be done. One of the greatest of musicians, Pepper could break your heart with a few notes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJ0jiFC7SX8 (Our Song)

And, finally, I have to recommend something by Charles Mingus as well, whose music was one of my first real introductions to jazz. I was a great fan of Frank Zappa in my teenage years and Mingus was one artist he continually namechecked as one of his biggest inspirations. I still remember picking up Mingus Ah Um and listening to it for the first time. An absolutely extraordinary experience. Although Black Saint And The Sinner Lady is his masterpiece, MIngus Ah Um is probably a better entry point. Bursting with life, it really is one of the most infectious and life-affirming collections of music I know.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEyETVtEg3A (Goodbye Pork Pie Hat)

[Rocker]

Thanks guys for the replies. My wife got me the disk suggested by Ivor and it is exactly what I was looking for. Over the next few months I will get one or two of the other suggestions, fusion is likely to be the next tried.

Once again, many thanks.