Rock guy looking to learn some Jazz - what should i start listening too?

Da Funky Fish · #1 11-22-2012, 08:26 PM

Hi,

i am thinking of learning how to read music (have not done since high school) and also take jazz lessons after the holidays. I am a rock guy so I was wondering if anyone can suggest jazz artists or groups i need to start listening to. Im assuming I'd benefit from saturating myself with it and I do good when listening to tracks on my headphones during my boring commute. I really get tunes I am into in my head that way, weird but it works.

Thanks!

scottfeldstein · #2 11-23-2012, 10:41 AM

No idea. But you might find this interesting.

http://scottsbasslessons.com/walking...eginner-1.html

cloverkeys · #3 11-23-2012, 10:48 AM

There are a lot of different styles of jazz to consider.

However, Steely Dan is sort of a rock progressions meet jazz harmony type of band.
Check out the album Aja and Gaucho.

MrLenny1 · #4 11-23-2012, 01:00 PM

My first JAZZ album was Chick Corea's Light As a Feather.
It was a gift from one of my music buddies.
He told me , you know there is more to music than just ROCK.
It took me a whole year to digest that album.
Got me hooked on JAZZ.

Phalex · #5 11-23-2012, 01:06 PM

For electric stuff:

Jean Luc Ponty
Billy Cobham
Spyro Gyra

MontzterMash · #6 11-23-2012, 01:25 PM

Fun!

For me, it was:

Charles Mingus
Stanley Clarke
Dave Brubeck
Lee Ritenour (my first jazz concert ever: saw him with Melvin Lee Davis on the 6 String Theory tour - wow)
Lee Morgan
Cannonball Adderley

DirtySix · #7 11-23-2012, 01:30 PM

I'm subscribing to this one. Was trying to find jazz to listen to last night but have no idea where to start.

Schlyder · #8 11-23-2012, 01:39 PM

Jaco Pastorius
UZEB (Alain Caron)
Stanley Clarke
Marcus Miller
YellowJackets (Jimmy Haslip)
Brian Bromberg

plus many more... Check out BassontheBroadband.com 24/7 streaming bass orientated music (mainly jazz and fusion, but also classical and rock )

mambo4 · #9 11-23-2012, 02:17 PM

this list is a good start for someone looking o get into jazz:
http://www.thejazzresource.com/top_25_jazz_albums.html

**eddododo** · #10 11-23-2012, 02:21 PM

Charles Mingus- Ah Um

Amazing jazz album, start to finish.

Get it immediately

sevdog · #11 11-23-2012, 02:34 PM

Miles and Coltrane.

All else is superfluous.

sevdog · #12 11-23-2012, 02:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mambo4

this list is a good start for someone looking o get into jazz:
http://www.thejazzresource.com/top_25_jazz_albums.html

^^^That's actually a really good list to start somebody off

...I would've said Miles, Coltrane, and Herbie Hancock if I didn't think of Hancock as more Jazz Fusion or Funk.

bolophonic · #13 11-23-2012, 02:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sevdog

Miles and Coltrane.

All else is superfluous.

Not even close.

Audiophage · #14 11-23-2012, 02:56 PM

Go out and see some local jazz if you can and talk to the bass players in those bands. Maybe they'll give you a lesson or two, or at least they'd be able to point you in the right direction.

sevdog · #15 11-23-2012, 02:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bolophonic

Not even close.

Ha! That didn't take long. Ok, I concede.

Gtripdub · #16 11-23-2012, 02:57 PM

louis armstrong..duke ellington..miles..coltrane..mingus...lee morgan..jimmy smith..

**eddododo** · #17 11-23-2012, 03:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sevdog

Miles and Coltrane.

All else is superfluous.

Hmm.. Nah

Federighi · #18 11-23-2012, 03:23 PM

Check out the Brian Blade Fellowship album Perceptual. Truly some of the most amazing jazz available today. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQpyQWRJnPM (crooked creek is a personal favorite of mine).

Phalex · #19 11-23-2012, 03:34 PM

Best concert I ever saw was Bob James. He had a hell of a bass player on the Hands Down tour.

ntenny · #20 11-23-2012, 07:25 PM

The list is good, but neither Miles nor Coltrane gets a really good cross-section, because they both had so many different phases of their careers. It's worth checking out Coltrane's _Impressions_ (or the four-disc Village Vanguard boxed set that's a superset of it), an album of long modal improvisations, and the four albums _Relaxin'/Steamin'/Cookin'/Workin' With The Miles Davis Quintet_. A lot of people coming from a rock background seem to get into Miles's _Sketches Of Spain_ easily, too.

There's a fantastic, underappreciated album under Duke Ellington's name called _Money Jungle_; it's a trio of Duke, Mingus, and Max Roach, which is even better than it sounds like it would be.

Other artists I remember being lit up by at first hearing: Carla Bley (much of her work has Steve Swallow on bass), Eric Dolphy, Rahsaan Roland Kirk (big sprawling horn-centric improvisations, often with weird stuff like playing multiple horns at once), Gerry Mulligan, Bill Evans (whose approach to chords on piano probably has some lessons for us as bassists), Pharoah Sanders, Charles Lloyd.

Jazz is a huge world, with aspects that are include the dance-pop of several generations, alternative strains of classical music (if Mingus had been white, IMHO nobody would have any hesitancy about calling him a classical composer), experimental noise, pretty relaxing music, high-technique funk, and pretty much everything else. There's something in there for everybody.

-NT