BEST little know Jazz Album that you ever heard?


DUKE PEARSON THE RIGHT TOUCH 1969. I have it in my top 5 all time!

calvinj

"Straight Ahead", album by Oliver Nelson with Eric Dolphy, recorded in 1961 by Rudy Van Gelder at the Van Gelder studios.  Sublime.

Bothwell stopped playing music in 1949, at age 30, though he continued in the music business for the next 40+ years...Street of Dreams contains almost all his recordings as a band leader from the 40's...

@simonmoon Wednesdays 8:00-10:00 pm on KBGA (University of Montana radio station) is a show called, “Something Else!” by Bill Kautz.  
Great DJ. Good radio voice, professional, gives just enough talkin’ without being one of those blabberers, and plays avant-garde jazz & contemporary avant-garde classical.  
Great source for discovering current artists making that kind of music.
 

Another in that band is Ben Goldburg, who has many great albums, but I am hosting Thanksgiving and the boss says I got to get to work so you will have to check him out.

Happy Thanksgiving to you all!

 

Duke Pearson is mighty good. Try the big band recordings.

Allison Miller has two band members Todd Sicklafoose and Jenny Schienman who have many really good unknown records out.

 

Cecilia Strange "Blikan" and also "Blue"

JD Allen "Love Stone"

Caimir Liberski Trio "Evanescences"

Chico Hamilton has many great albums — but in the late 60s early 70s I had a demo copy of his album The Head Hunters.  It took me many years to find another copy and I can’t find it on CD, download, or streaming (Qobuz).  Erik Gayle on guitar. 

By the looks of the responses so far, it seems as if the majority of my collection would be "little known jazz albums".

For me, jazz is a growing, living, evolving art form, and I am always seeking out musicians making new music. I don’t look at it like a museum piece.

Of course, I love the older stuff (my interest in jazz starts with post bop and modal jazz), but there is so much great stuff from the very recent past, and from all the decades since the 60’s, too. Not to mention, contemporary jazz musicians have chops as good as anyone from the past.

Here’s just a very few (I could list many more) contemporary musicians, that are little known, but creating something new:

Michael Formenak (bass) - Small Places (2012)

Craig Taborn (keyboards) - Daylight Ghosts (2016)

Steve Coleman and the Five Elements (sax) - The Sonic Language Of Myth (1999)

Steve Coleman and the Council of Balance - Synovial Joints (2015)

Nat Birchal (sax) - Sacred Dimension (2011)

Mary Halvoron (guitar) - Amarylis (2022)

Ingrid Laubrock (sax) - Last Quiet Place (2023)

Avishai Cohen (trumpet) - Big Vicious (2020)

Alex Machacek (guitar) - Improvision (2007)

Rob Mazurek and Exploding Star Orchestra (trumpet) - Lightening Dreamers (2023)

 

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This thread would be a great advertisement for why you should have a streamer !!!  Enjoying the Bobo Stenson now, long weekend to listen to all the other great recommendations.  Then I’ll probably order a few on CD…

WOW!! This thread took off :-)

Thanks to all who are posting. I’ve got some free time coming up and am going to listen as many of your recommendations, as possible.

One of my favorite "little knowns" is the CD, On The Town, Pete Malinverni Plays Leonard Bernstein. Pete interprets Bernstein tunes from a number of the Maestro’s Broadway shows. The song "Somewhere" is linked-

 

You are so right ...

I concur completely ...

 

I'm not sure how many are familiar with the Bobo Stenson Trio but War Orphans is a great place to start.  He has more of a contemplative style and some of the best recording quality I've heard.  

Gary

I'm not sure how many are familiar with the Bobo Stenson Trio but War Orphans is a great place to start.  He has more of a contemplative style and some of the best recording quality I've heard.  

Gary

The Three, Joe Sample, Ray Brown, Shelly Anne. There is a direct to disk on vinyl. 

Historic Concerts - Cecil Taylor & Max Roach
- Live at McMillin Theater at Columbia University, New York City December 15, 1979

Round Trip - Sadao Watanabe with Chick Corea, Miroslav Vitouš and Jack DeJohnette

yes, agree, totally relative...the one available now at $79.99 comes to $16 an album...though I paid much less some years ago...for some issues worth it to me, for most not...

@jl35 

Yes -- they can be found used but "decent" is a relative term, depending upon one's budget. For example, I've long coveted the Mosaic 3 cd live Charles Tolliver set but the lowest price I see today is $80.00 -- too expensive for me! 

@mahgister

Thanks for the recommendation ... Especially because i am not a flute lover ...But i like to provoke my innate taste to go on new road...

You’re welcome. I’m not a flute-lover, either, mahgister but I do like Tabackin’s playing. ;o)

He’s recorded at least one album of all flute:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3tAOck1SqI&list=OLAK5uy_lbfCZRneKkpiljYWBJ478KR-sPYmcXTpQ&index=3

 

 

 

stuartk, the album you recommended with flute is astonishingly good ...

I am tempted to say that his flute mastery exceed sax ...

Tabackin  live in Japan and was married to a japan musician , flute playing in Japan produce supreme masters from the Zen school  , we can hear something of their sound in Tabackin playing phrase  ...

Thanks for the recommendation ... Especially because i am not a flute lover ...But i like to provoke my innate taste to go on new road...

Lew Tabackin has also released excellent recordings as a leader. Not only does he excel on sax but he has one of the most distinctive styles on flute in Jazz.

I know the Mosaics are long gone, but still sometimes on ebay at decent prices, considering it’s 5 albums...and now that I'm reminded, going to play mine now .. Thanks !!!

*I did not know this one... Thanks stuartk ...

😁😊

One of L. Tabackin's excellent releases as a leader w/ Hank Jones, Victor Lewis, Dave Holland:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=da6X_5XPHPc

Mosaic had a great 3 CD set of the five 70's RCA albums from Tabackin/Akioshi, great music and sonics...

Discogs listings For T. Akioshi /L.Tabackin Big Band releases:

https://www.discogs.com/artist/257337-Toshiko-Akiyoshi-Lew-Tabackin-Big-Band

 

One of L. Tabackin’s excellent releases as a leader w/ Hank Jones, Victor Lewis, Dave Holland:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=da6X_5XPHPc

@linnvolk 

Lew Tabackin has also released excellent recordings as a leader. Not only does he excel on sax but he has one of the most distinctive styles on flute in Jazz.

 

Lew Tabackin/Toshiko Akioshi Big Band.

All their albums are top jazz band ...

This one is one of the best known...

I concur ...

It is not so much unknown that an album who deserve to be more well known ...But i dont think it is well known... For me well known is common name in jazz ...Miles Davis , Chet baker, etc Brad Meldhau ... Etc

Who knows Jan Johansson piano trio albums or solo one , one of the most creative in swedish jazz history ?

Who said that there is no great jazz musician in Sweden ? 😁 not me...

All his albums deserved to be known out of Sweden ...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2D5HlKLh34&t=15s

Jazz for me became after the war a universal musical expression worldwide...As classical  became ...

It is why half of my jazz listening is out of North America  where jazz is born ...

 

 

Possibly more "difficult to find" than "unknown," but "Long Yellow Road" by the Lew Tabackin/Toshiko Akioshi Big Band.

Possibly more "difficult to find" than "unknown," but "Long Yellow Road" by the Lew Tabackin/Toshiko Akioshi Big Band.  

@calvinj

Everyone knows S. Turrentine for his Blues-soaked workouts but my favorite of his is actually more straight ahead, and as such, is perhaps not so well known:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2HWKdQEnfcI&list=PLE1SK0O9FkE6WskguWMTWEFvrz0UZiJOU

@mahgister

For sure if not the best the second best jazz album of all times ...

But i dont even know what beat it ...

Yes -- it’s very hard to surpass!