Any jazz fans here?

What sort of Jazz?

Jazz covers a lot of ground. It's a bit like asking for recommendations in Dance Music - do you mean Techno, Drum & Bass, Dub Step, Breakbeat, Garage, House etc.

What sort of music do you like now? If you are comming from a Rock background then something like Electric Masada, mid-70's Gong (You, Shamal etc) Herbie Hancock/Headhunters might appeal.

If you way more free form experimental stuff check out Sun Ra; Lanquidity or Strange Celestial Road would be good places to start.

If you are into funkier stuff you should try Deodato (Prelude), Sabu Martinez (Afro Temple) or Connie Price & The Keystones (Wildflowers).

Whatever you are into you should listen to Miles Davis (Aura, A Kind Of Blue, Bitches Brew, Live Evil), he is a genre in himself.

There is also an series of compilation albums called Diggin Deeper: The Birth of Acid Jazz which are fairly good and very diverse.

I am also personaly very fond of Jeffrey Leighton Brown, Contemporary Noise Quintet, Wayne Horovitz (as Zony Mash), Alice Coltrane, Pharoah Sanders, Joe McPhee and Herbie Mann. Though these all do cover a variety of styles and not everything they have done is brilliant.

Finally, the London Jazz Festival is underway some time around now, and it has quite a lot of coverage on Radio 3. Check the listings and iPlayer. See if there's anything you like.

Hope this helps.
 
A few artists to check out are:

- Miles Davies - as mentioned, Kind of Blue is almost compulsory listening.

- The Dave Brubeck Quartet - Paul Desmond on alto and Joe Morello on the kit, some of the most sublime musicianship you will hear. Also, their Time series albums are fantastic.

- Freddie Hubbard - this is more hard bop/funk, but Freddie is a magnificent trumpet/flugel player. Red Clay and Backlash are worth checking out.

- Charlie Parker - along with Diz, one of the men to be most credited to inventing bebop (my favourite sub genre of jazz).

- Barney Kessel - a bebop guitar player, one of the best of all time, he was also the first electric guitar player to record without a piano player.

- George Benson - a legendary guitar player, massively influential and was one of the first to fuse pop and jazz together (great albums are Tenderly, It's Uptown, Masquerade).

- Bill Evans - a great piano player that played on Miles Davis' Kind of Blue, but has also led many a band, each being great. He was a true master of his instrument....

- John Coltrane - if you're in the mood for something a little more challenging, check the Coltrane out. He's a hard bop tenor player and also played on Kind of Blue. Blue Trane, Coltrane and A Love Supreme are three very good albums.

A few to start, get to work! :p
 
You're missing out [/useful post]

Later on tonight, I'll just sit in the dark with headphones on and have a listen to Sonny Rollins' St. Thomas I think.

I have to be 'in the mood' to listen to them but that's the same for all music.
 
I have to say, I used to love St. Thomas but it's one of the most played standards of all time, ever. Every time I go out and dep for someone, I hear "St. Thomas!".... :p It's a great tune, but oh maan, it's a little bit too great. :p PS It's also on GTA:IV, I couldn't believe my ears at first. :D

And by the way, I don't think you know how much music you're saying you don't like when you say you don't like jazz. Obviously I'm not saying that everyone has to like it, but seriously, there is SO SO SO much encompassed within the term 'jazz', I don't see how anyone could hate it all.
 
naffa have a listent to Stanton Moore "Chilcock" (off the Stanton Moore III album) it might be of interest to you being a sax player.

Actually a lot of Stanton's "All Kooked Out!" album too.. although more drum based. Moore is an Orleans drummer that I've got lot of his albums. Lots of Sax bits courtesy of Skerik.
 
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All I could find was a thirty second extract on iTunes, but it did indeed sound pretty sweet. I'm actually a guitarist, but I love playing sax lines on guitar, also I just feel that there aren't really any guitarists I've heard that can musically do what Bird and such did.

I'll definitely check out All Kooked Out as well. I've always been hovering around Moore's playing, but have never delved in, so to speak. Maybe now is that time. :p

EDIT: I have to be up in five hours... Why do I do this to myself? :o
 
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I've been listening to a lot of John Coltrane recently. Superb musician with a lot of truly groundbreaking records of the genre, especially the Free Jazz movement. Although I will say it's probably somewhat more of an acquired taste than something you can just 'listen' to in the background. His earlier work is more easily accessible if you haven't listened to much Jazz music though, I highly recommend giving it a try.
 
It hasn't been mentioned yet but for a taste of continental/gypsy jazz try the works of Django Reinhardt. Listen to the Django Reinhardt Anthology on Spotify as a good introduction to his style, it does contain probably his most famous piece 'Minor Swing' which you may have heard before but never put a name to it.
 
Django Reinhardt was indeed one of the greatest guitarists in living history. He was the first guitarist to show that the guitar really could play a lead line in a piece of jazz music, before hand the guitar had always been solely confined to the rhythm section. His relationship with Stephane Grappelli was very good as well, they both got the very best out each other. A problem that a lot of people have, listening to Django recordings, is the quality of them as they were recorded so long ago (I personally love it). If this is a problem for you, but you enjoy the genre, you could check out Bireli Lagrene or Stochelo Rosenberg.
 
Me being me, I have to suggest you take a delve into the Swing side of Jazz, too :)

I'm not smart enough to follow come of the really clever rhythms of the improv or later stuff, but I /love/ the lazy beat of swing.

Glenn Miller & Benny Goodman are probably the two big names, but aside from a few tunes you may find most of it a bit slow-going.

Bix Beiderbecke (very 1920s and often poor quality recordings, but I love it), Django Reinhardt, Cab Calloway, Jimmie Lunceford, Louis Prima... on and on... :)
 
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I'm Shocked at myself How could I forget...

The Blues Brothers!

Elwood said:
And remember, people, that no matter who you are and what you do to live, thrive and survive, there're still some things that makes us all the same. You. Me. Them. Everybody. Everybody.
Click to expand...
 
Definitely start with some Miles Davis and John Coltrane, but also check out John McLaughlin for some great jazz fusion :)
 
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