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IF someone were to ask me to get them started in Jazz

post #1 of 26
7/20/10 at 5:54am
Thread Starter 

Well a friend of mine asked me to get him into jazz last week and I finally got around to getting him some suggestions.  I put them into 3 sets of 10 albums each, trying not to repeat an artist within the same set.  I tried to get albums that as he progressed through the sets, he wouldn't lose interest.

 

Set I

  1. Bill Evans Trio - Waltz For Debby
  2. Cannonball Adderley - Somethin' Else
  3. Dave Brubeck - Time Out
  4. Grant Green - Idel Moments
  5. John Coltrane - A Love Supreme
  6. Miles Davis - Kind of Blue
  7. Herbie Hancock - Empyrean Isles
  8. Art Blakey - Moanin'
  9. The Oscar Peterson Trio - Night Train
  10. Charles Mingus - Ah Um

 

Set II

  1. Kenny Burell - Midnight Blue
  2. Lee Morgan - The Sidewinder
  3. Wayne Shorter - Speak No Evil
  4. Wes Montgomery - The Incredible Jazz Guitar of...
  5. Dextor Gordon - Go
  6. Eric Dolphy - Out to Lunch
  7. John Coltrane - Giant Steps
  8. Miles Davis - Miles Smiles
  9. Stan Getz & Joao Gilberto - Getz/Gilberto
  10. Art Pepper - Art Pepper Meets the Rhythm Section

 

Set III

  1. Ornette Coleman - The Shape of Jazz to Come
  2. Donald Byrd Band - A New Perspective
  3. Miles Davis - Sketches of Spain
  4. Clifford Brown & Max Roach - Clifford Brown & Max Roach
  5. John Coltrane - Coltrane
  6. Keith Jarrett - The Koln Concert
  7. Sonny Rollins - Saxophone Colossus
  8. Charles Mingus - The Black Saint & The Sinner Lady
  9. Bill Evans - Sunday at the Village Vanguard
  10. Thelonius Monk - Brilliant Corners

 

Thoughts?  Picking 10 albums for each set was quite a task.  The first set was pretty easy.  The 2nd set, I leaned on Blue Note recordings and the 3rd set I feel is a more advanced set after he's become used to jazz music.  Should take him a year to get through all the music and now it well enough to pick out the tunes from the first note. 


Your thoughts and comments welcomed.

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post #2 of 26
7/20/10 at 6:36am

Question: Does any early jazz excite you, like, say, Duke Ellington or Louis Armstrong? That seems missing. Ellington's Such Sweet Thunder, …and His Mother Called Him Bill or The Far-East Suite would fit nicely among your choices, as would Armstrong's Hot Fives and Sevens or his work with Earl Hines. Maybe Billie Holiday + Lester Young: A Musical Romance?

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post #3 of 26
7/20/10 at 7:13am
Thread Starter 

Early jazz is not much of my collection.  The collection noted above is from a particular period in which I find the most interesting.

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post #4 of 26
7/20/10 at 7:23am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Razeus View Post

Early jazz is not much of my collection.  The collection noted above is from a particular period in which I find the most interesting.


Cool. We all have our preferences. I should point out that all the Ellington albums mentioned above are actually from the same period as your choices, and let me tell you, they're killin'.

 

Oh, and while I'm responding, let me put in a plug for Thelonious Monk's Genius Of Modern Music, Vols. 1 and 2. Those discs are kray-zy good, cornerstones of the repertoire I think.

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post #5 of 26
7/20/10 at 11:07am
It seems that very few people here on this forum know anything about anything but the declining years of jazz's prominence. It's a shame that kids have such a narrow frame of reference... No movies before Star Wars, no popular music before the Beatles, no jazz before Dizzy. It's as if the greatest artistic flowering of modern times never existed. Perhaps it has something to do with the spirit of optimism and self reliance that runs through this stuff. The "great generation" must seem like a million miles away from "generation x". When you think about it, cynicism and coldness is what killed jazz. The fun and optimistic part of jazz was channelled off into jump blues, merged with country to form rockabilly, and eventually became rock n roll. Rock plowed jazz under and eventually absorbed much of it.
Edited by bigshot - 7/20/10 at 11:09am
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post #6 of 26
7/20/10 at 11:58am

How about some Vocalists? I find that in many cases people can relate to vocals on a gut level especially when some of the greats are doing their thing.


Edited by JadeEast - 7/20/10 at 2:44pm
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post #7 of 26
7/20/10 at 12:44pm

I don't listen to Jazz because:

 

1. Availability & Exposure

 

Thanks for posting some suggestions... I should be able to broaden my musical horizon. By the way, I am a sucker for good, witful, or unique lyrics, any Jazz artist you would recommend?

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post #8 of 26
7/20/10 at 2:06pm
Great post, bigshot. I initially got into jazz through the later stuff, but have made an effort to go earlier. There's a lot of wonderful music there, mostly ignored today. I'd like to say the same for a lot of the early folk and bluegrass, too, but don't want to derail a jazz thread.
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post #9 of 26
7/20/10 at 2:37pm

Mose Allison, Jim Ferguson, Jon Hendricks (the latter two do a lot of covers).
 

Quote:
Originally Posted by stevenswall View Post

I don't listen to Jazz because:

 

1. Availability & Exposure

 

Thanks for posting some suggestions... I should be able to broaden my musical horizon. By the way, I am a sucker for good, witful, or unique lyrics, any Jazz artist you would recommend?

Reply
post #10 of 26
7/20/10 at 3:08pm

 

Hello, folks! I'm looking into getting into listening to jazz recreationally after playing for four years in high school bands. My last couple years we've played almost exclusively Ellington for an annual competition, and while I've listened, it's never been off of an album. One of my favorite Ellington tunes that I heard was Portrait for Mahalia Jackson, does anyone know what album that is off of? 

 

Hi Trublu! I don't know if you remember me, but EE went great!


Edited by logwed - 7/20/10 at 4:22pm
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post #11 of 26
7/20/10 at 4:22pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by bigshot View Post

It seems that very few people here on this forum know anything about anything but the declining years of jazz's prominence. It's a shame that kids have such a narrow frame of reference... No movies before Star Wars, no popular music before the Beatles, no jazz before Dizzy. It's as if the greatest artistic flowering of modern times never existed. Perhaps it has something to do with the spirit of optimism and self reliance that runs through this stuff. The "great generation" must seem like a million miles away from "generation x". When you think about it, cynicism and coldness is what killed jazz. The fun and optimistic part of jazz was channelled off into jump blues, merged with country to form rockabilly, and eventually became rock n roll. Rock plowed jazz under and eventually absorbed much of it.


Oh, well excuse me. 

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post #12 of 26
7/20/10 at 6:42pm



 

Quote:
Originally Posted by bigshot View Post

It seems that very few people here on this forum know anything about anything but the declining years of jazz's prominence. It's a shame that kids have such a narrow frame of reference... No movies before Star Wars, no popular music before the Beatles, no jazz before Dizzy. It's as if the greatest artistic flowering of modern times never existed. Perhaps it has something to do with the spirit of optimism and self reliance that runs through this stuff. The "great generation" must seem like a million miles away from "generation x". When you think about it, cynicism and coldness is what killed jazz. The fun and optimistic part of jazz was channelled off into jump blues, merged with country to form rockabilly, and eventually became rock n roll. Rock plowed jazz under and eventually absorbed much of it.

I'd say the opposite is true.  No one on this forum seems to understand that jazz exists after 1970 as 99.999% of the conversation is all pre-1970.  Jazz is alive and kicking but if it detracts from "traditional" it is considered garbage.  Talk about a narrow frame of reference....

 

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post #13 of 26
7/21/10 at 8:03am

If someone is trying to come up with thirty recordings, the focus will either be narrow in terms of time period or very thin in terms of giving any idea of what was going on.  More happened in a few decade than had for several geological ages prior....

 

OK, hyperbole rules.  But still.  My list would be different, but I think Razeus' attempt is admirable.  (I also happen to LOVE the Count Basie 1930s Deccas, for one example, and Paul Motian's 80s band with Lovano and Frisell, for another example, or the "harmolodic", post-Ornette music around guys like Ronald Shannon Jackson and James Blood Ulmer, as much as any music. And could go on and on, into both earlier and more recent music, but then I'm having great sympathy for having to keep a short list rather than just hand someone The Penguin Guide to Recorded Jazz and saying "have at it!").

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post #14 of 26
7/21/10 at 6:40pm

Miles Davis...Kind of Blue would be higher on my list

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post #15 of 26
7/22/10 at 6:39pm
Thread Starter 

the set lists aren't in any particular order.

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