Essential Blues/ jazz

House of Blues Essential (Box Set) would be a decent start for a broad intro to the Blues. Throw in some Stevie Ray Vaughan (eg Real Deal Vol 2), the Willie Dixon Chess Box (Dixon songs covered by a bunch of other artists - all classic blues songs), and maybe some Allman Bros, Susan Tedeschi, and you're covering a lot of ground. There's also a great acoustic blues CD called Hellhound on my Trail - the Songs of Robert Johnson (covered by others) that I really enjoy.

Hey, and don't forget - Cream, the Yardbirds, and Zep I of course. Being a rock fan you've probably already listened to a lot of blues covers with a heavier drumbeat.

To see where jazz might be heading, or at least is right now, I'd like to add my favorite jazz albums of the last few years.

Joshua Redman: Elastic

Brad Mehldau: Largo

Marco

The long list from rrsands is just amazing, especially for Tidal users like myself. Not only has the list helped expand my exposure to jazz, the sound quality of those albums that are available on Tidal is excellent, and most are available. I don’t know if record sound quality was a factor when the list was compiled, or if it is just a collection of each artist’s best albums, but almost every album on the list is a home run when streamed from Tidal. I’m so glad I found it. I added 95% of them to My Albums collection. It’s amazing how well that old list works with music streaming today, and how well curated it is for SQ.   

All Muddy Waters records on Chess are a must.