RIP Hank Jones

Elegance,passion,beauty and humility.Skills beyond description.a career than spanned over 988 sessions from 1944 to 2009 and still a few uncounted.An awe inspiring contribution to the music.Perhaps only rivaled by bassist Milt Hinton who recorded from 1930 to 2002 on 1196 documented Jazz sessions and probably hundreds more as a pop session player and studio musician.Compare the Hank Jones stats to two of the most recorded Jazz drummers in history-Jo Jones 509 sessions from 1931 to 1982 and Billy Higgins,475 sessions in the years 1957 to 2001.Jones created a profound standard of excellence.He will be remembered.

Yes, rest in peace Hank Jones, God bless.

Yes, RIP.

Ben Ratliff's book, The Jazz Ear, has a chapter devoted to Hank Jones' contributions and his reflections on his craft.

Just think of all of the changes in Jazz and in popular music in general that Hank Jones got to witness first hand. The fact that he was a vital, truly outstanding contributor for most of SEVEN decades is awe-inspiring. I cannot think of many humans that can lay claim to such a feat in any form of human endeavor. Hank was one of those rare gifts to humanity that we should be profoundly inspired by.