Can you recommend Jazz for some one that doesn't like Jazz?
Let me explain, I have tried to like jazz for over 30 years. I rarely find something I like. To me it sounds too disjointed, like everyone is trying to out do the others and they are all playing a different song. I know there has to be some good instrumental smooth jazz artists I am missing. If you have any suggestions of whom to try let me know. Some that are on my Jazz playlist is Pat Metheny-"It's for you" Bill Frisell _"Heard it through the grapevine" Holly Cole, George Benson... for an example of things I do like.
I'd love to have a 100 song Jazz playlist. So what'ch got for me?
Thanks
I agree with onhwy61. You say it all in your title. There's so much good music out there If you've been trying for 30 years and you just don't get it, why bother. onhwy61 is right, It's not like anything is going to change. I don't think one day you will proclaim OH, now I get it. Listen to what you like, don't force yourself to like a genre you think your "supposed" to like. Isn't that the point. |
Very melodic jazz/blues artist that I love is Gene Harris. He was a fantastic pianist with his own style and his Quartet recordings often had Ray Brown on bass and Jeff Hamilton on drums. He also recorded several Big Band albums in the style of Count Basie. Diana Krall is a modern sultry pianist/vocalist that has a very large audience appeal. For contemporary "cool jazz" I recommend the Rippingtons, Peter White, Richard Elliot and David Benoit. |
It sounds like what you like is composition, through-composition. Nothing wrong with that. The most extreme version of the jazz you are not into as much would be free jazz, starting, say, at the beginning of the 60s. But there are many jazz composers who incorporate the shift to modal progressions (as opposed to standard blues progressions, pentatonic scales, etc) in the 1950s. Try the collaborations between Miles Davis and Gil Evans (Porgy and Bess; Sketches of Spain), Evans' Out of the Cool, Henry Mancini, Quincy Jones, Oliver Nelson (Blues and the Abstract Truth), or Lalo Schiffrin. I wouldn't turn my nose up at John Barry's early James Bond soundtracks either. Glad you are exploring Wes Montgomery. Although firmly in blues traditions, Jimmie Smith is a genius improviser/composer, and his collaborations with Wes are amazing. In my opinion, exploring that golden age of the late 50s, early 60s, on the cusp of the turn to free jazz and fusion, will provide some great entry points. Then you can stretch from there into the records of Miles Davis' second group: ESP, Sorcerer, Miles Smiles, etc. and on from there. Enjoy! ps - Jeff Parker is a genius. Check out Isotope 217's _The Unstable Molecule_ from the 1990s. |
