The musician of the 20th century?

[walking Bass]

If there are any classical music fans, YoYo Ma is extraordinary. I was fortunate to see him several times with the San Francisco Symphony both as a soloist and as part of small ensembles. He brought energy, joy and perfection every time.

 

[B Minor Threat]

A couple of GOATs that haven't been mentioned...

Jerry Douglas
Jake Shimabukuro

 

[Lefty Joe]

Jimmy Webb

I see where you're coming from, there ... was just reading yesterday about "MacArthur Park" being a cantata, and noticing that Wikipedia's page for "cantata" doesn't mention it in the examples of modern compositions. Definitely overlooked there.

All potential answers come with some rationalization, and I find myself going more toward the Armstrong / Ellington / Stravinsky choices. John Williams was an interesting nomination: very effective, even as he so often magpies his ideas from others. But that's true of all artists.

But really: a century is an arbitrary segment of time - the 20th-c particularly distinguished by music distributed in recorded form. So perhaps the real 'musician' of the 20th century is the phonograph.

 

[EdwardofHuncote]

I see the whole thing as a continuum...

 

[jerry]

I'm going to say Miles, hundreds of CDs/LPs in just my library are because of him and the various artists that were his side men and then that artist side men. Just take Chick Corea, after he leaves Miles band he and his various side men through the years like Stanley, Patitucci, Lenny White, Avishai Cohen, Joe Farrell etc. occupy shelves and shelves themselves in my music room.
The musical tree of history is a very large and beautiful thing.

 

[DanDBassist]

My personal list would be so many more than one, since the 20th century was so prolific.

 

[Sertsa]

Personally, my all time biggest musical influence is Coltrane. If I ever make it to San Francisco I'd even like to attend the church in his name, mostly out of curiosity. He's not one of my favorite composers, though. In jazz, those would be Ellington, Monk, Mingus, Shorter. In classical, sticking to 20th century, Stravinsky.

 

[doctone]

Stevie Wonder

 

[Spectrum]

Niki Sixx

 

[Passinwind]

John Coltrane as a player, Duke Ellington or Miles as an all around choice.

 

[winston]

To my ears, the musical era we’re still in began with Claude Debussy, and pop music as we know it started with Louis Armstrong.

 

[Picton]

Nobody has mentioned Django, whose musical chops were incredible.

Impossible to pick just one.

 

[BadMonk]

So many choices but haven't seen B B King mentioned so I'll go with him.

 

[doctone]

BTW, i think that to name just one is the fun in this game. Needless to say, I love a lot of other musicians too.

 

[FretRiff]

Biggest cross-genre, cross-border influences: Paul McCartney/Beatles, Bob Marley, Louis Armstrong. Interestingly enough, most modern music in the US and around the world ignore these choices as overt influences.

Composition-related: Antonio Carlos Jobim, Ravi Shankar, John WIlliams, Ennio Morricone

Biggest influences in performance/persona: Elvis, Miriam Makeba

Latin America: Antonio Carlos Jobim, Celia Cruz, Carlos Gardel

African/Afro-Diaspora: Fela Kuti, Bob Marley, Miriam Makeba

Anglo-American Pop/Rock: Paul McCartney/Beatles, Bob Dylan, Stevie Wonder

East Asia: Teresa Teng, Hibari Misora, Patti Kim

My top three are from UK/US/Jamaica and speak English as their primary language. But I think this thread probably overly represents Americans if you're not specifically English-language popular music. Eleven on my list don't have English as their primary language.

 

[Jaycat]

 

[Maxi Funkl]

Lots of greats hard to pick just one but my personal influences George Clinton & Maurice White.

But it all starts with Robert Johnson even if I didn't know it or about him until I was in my late 20's or early 30's.

Like many mentioned already the folks that made music pivot after them because of them. Hubie, Armstrong, Duke, Miles, Bird, Aretha, Billie, Jimi, James Brown, Berry, Wes Montgomery, EVH, SLY, Wonder, Marley, Willie Dixon, Kurt Cobain, Charlie Christain & Sam Cooke just to name a few... its all really a matter of taste and Exposure.

Blue Note, Chess Records, Motown, & Stax lots of genius on these labels I cannot even to begin imagining modern music without them and their artists influence.

Edit: most underrated Issac Hayes, Smokey Robinson, & Holland Dozier Holland.

 

[jeffmaccora]

Stevie Wonder?!

 

[fdeck]

I'm thinking of Ellington here because his influence spanned so many decades, and touched so many other musicians.

 

[_Obra_]

Prince