maybe I was raised by record store wolves or something, but most of what's been posted in this thread isn't Modern Jazz.

My understanding of Modern Jazz is mid 50's to mid 60's. This means basically birth of the cool, hard bop and the non "free" stuff.

i equated "Modern" with what is currently happening and available...

i am prepared to be wrong about this.

still, make a suggestion dammit!

Skronk wrote:what are some new jazz albums you can recommend?

krakabash wrote:Lee Morgan.

Died in 1972. Great stuff, though.

For some good aggressive stuff, I'd recommend The Bad Plus and The Happy Apples. The Bad Plus catch a lot of flack amongst traditionalists for doing jazz arrangements of pop tunes, but seeing as how that's how most standards were created, I welcome their approach. I'm happy to see someone creating new standards. Plus, I think their original stuff is pretty great.

Frank Kimbrough is also an excellent pianist, although I'd put him in more of the "modern piano composer" category than really hard swinging stuff in a traditional sense. Really beautiful player, though.

ECM has been putting out good stuff lately and my favorite recent releases have been Paul Motian's records, although again, they're a little looser and free.

In the free jazz category, though, I'm surprised that no one has mentioned that Ornette Coleman has a relatively new record out. Kind of hard to top him. Kenny Garrett is also another pretty solid pick.

Chris Garges
Charlotte, NC

LBx wrote:
still, make a suggestion dammit!

Milt Jackson, MJQ, Bill Evans, Gunther Schuller, Brubeck, Paul Desmond, Lee Konitz, Stan Getz, Dexter Gordon, Wardell Gray, Hank Mobley, Freddie Hubbard, Horace Silver, John Lewis, Ahmad Jamal, Sonny Clark, Clifford Brown, Kenny Dorham, Art Blakey, Donald Byrd, Blue Mitchell

What exactly do you mean by "modern" jazz?

Charles Mingus, Coltrane, Charlie Parker, Ornette, Art Blakey, Dave Brubeck, Miles all fit into "modern jazz".

Do you mean free jazz? avant-garde jazz? Fusion?

My favorite avant garde jazz musicians are:

Ornette Coleman
Anthony Braxton
Albert Ayler
Charlie Hayden
Sam Rivers
Sun Ra
Albert Brotzmann
Derek Bailey
and of course John Zorn.

Free Jazz was an avant-garde innovation of modern jazz from the '50s and early '60s, that emphasized improvisation almost to the point of zero preplanning of song structure. Some of my fave "free jazz" artists are:

Ornette Coleman (of course)
Eric Dolphy
Albert Ayler
Evan Parker
Sun Ra

I'm not a huge fan of most fusion, but there's some interesting stuff out there. Fusion is basically the melding of jazz with rock and various ethnic or "world music" styles. Some decent stuff:

Miles Davis' later stuff
John McLaughlin and Mahavishnu Orchestra
Jeff Beck
Herbie Hancock
James Blood Ulmer
Jean-Luc Ponty
Al Dimeaola
Alain Caron
Carlos Santana
Steely Dan
Jaco Pastorious

honeyisfunny wrote:The new Vandermark thing 'Powerhouse Sound' (recorded in part by Bob Weston I think?) is awesome. Jeff Parker's guitar on it is really great, as is everything.

I second this like a motherfucker. Oslo/Chicago breaks is an awesome record. and Yes, the Chicago half was recorded by Bob Weston at Semaphore.

WoundedFoot wrote:

honeyisfunny wrote:The new Vandermark thing 'Powerhouse Sound' (recorded in part by Bob Weston I think?) is awesome. Jeff Parker's guitar on it is really great, as is everything.

I second this like a motherfucker. Oslo/Chicago breaks is an awesome record. and Yes, the Chicago half was recorded by Bob Weston at Semaphore.

Yeah Vandermark is awesome, as are Jeff Parker, Nathan McBride, Michael Zerang and many of the other guys he's played with over the years.