EBrew

Walter Smith III Tim Warfield Brice Winston

I'm so glad that someone hipped me to this thread. I've learned so much just reading the dialog between everyone. I'm an adult beginning trumpet player of 5 years. One thing that has improved my playing more than anything is listening. Constantly. Over the past few months I've been listening to a lot of Woody Shaw. The man never ceases to amaze and teach me. While I can't tell you technically or in theory what he is doing, my ears tell me that it is all wonderful. In the short time that I’ve been getting into him he has quickly risen to the top of my all time favorite list. He was a master of his instrument, a master of the language and an amazingly creative composer. The first CD that I purchased with Woody Shaw was Unity. My Favorite track? Moontrane. Later a friend of mine suggested I check out Little Red’s Fantasy. That really got the ball rolling and I’ve been buying anything with his name on it ever since. I purchased all the Live CDs 1-4 and I have to agree with everyone here… it is a feast for the ears and soul. My favorite of them all is Vol 3 – The ballad paced Little Red and Organ Grinder get frequent playing time. I also love his work with Horace Silver including Cape Verdean Blues and the diamond in the rough – The Jody Grind. Also be sure to scoop up the Mal Waldron Live at the Village Vanguard DVD. I love Woody’s playing on “All Alone.” It is great to hear others sound off about Woody Shaw. He is one of the most underrated players in jazz. As a trumpet player he had few equals in my opinion. He could blister through an up tempo number and then bring you to tears in a ballad. His combination of technique and creativity continues to blow me away and expands my mind to what is possible. The new website is fantastic. Be sure to pick up your Woody Shaw t-shirts! I’ve got 2.

These are excellent suggestions. Thanks to everyone for your help! I may have to grab some of these for myself

I recently purchased Kind of Blue for my mother and she loved it. Before listening to that CD she was definitely in the camp of people who thought that smooth jazz was the ONLY jazz. Now that I have her hooked I want to keep her interested. I’m trying to get a few CDs to add to her collection. Any suggestions? I’m thinking stuff like Miles Ahead but small combo stuff would be great too. Hank Mobley’s Soul Station? Anything with Kelly, Cobb, Chambers rhythm section? I don't want to bombard her with the adventerous stuff that I listen to - yet. Thanks in advance.

Just walked 4 blocks in the rain to pick up the last copy. Listening to the first cut and T's solo... it was worth it. B)

Considering how hard it is to play jazz - NO musician is overrated in comparison to main stream artists.

I became familiar with Hank through my love for Lee Morgan. I picked up any and every CD I could with Lee on it and he recorded some great albums with Hank on Blue Note. He is a solid player with a soulful sound, he writes some great heads and as someone else stated he is a master of the vocabulary. On a hard bop date he would be the man I would search out to play... unless I could get Wayne Shorter. I recently picked up Miles Live at the Blackhawk Complete and Hank blew me away. I love live recordings because they give you a better track to what the player is really about. There is that danger of catching them on a really bad night and being completely turned off. It is difficult to sell other people on players that they don't connect to. This thread however is a way to make a few folks go back and listen to see if they hear the things that others were able to find. Maybe a new angle to approach an artist's music. There are more than a few CDs that I revisited after hearing someone else talk about things that I missed. That being said - SoulStation would have been perfect if he had gotten a trumpet player for that date. Lee or Freddie weren't available??? B)

Thanks for website compliment. It's what I work on when I'm not driving my wife (and dog) crazy practicing trumpet. I keep thinking she is gonna hide it from me one day... There are two albums with Jeremy as the leader - "Profile" is his first release on Fresh Sound New Talent Records and Insight is the second on Crisscross. Both are fantastic albums with music on in the vein of the 60s Miles Davis Quintet. He also plays on Ralph Peterson's "Art of War" which is also really good. He's got a website with some live performance files that are definitely worth a listen - http://www.peltjazz.com. Big files but worth the download (free).

I brought this CD mainly because it had Ryan Kisor on it. He is one of my favorite players - amazing technique and the musical ideas to go with it. I really enjoyed it. My favorite cuts were the title track and My Little Sunflower. If I was still playing tenor sax I would listen to Blanding for sound ideas. Great tone. I agree with another poster regarding Criss Cross Jazz. They have some great artists on that label... especially trumpet players like Alex Sipiagin and Jeremy Pelt. Pelt has a new release called "Insight" that is fantastic. He's a solid player/composer and definitely worth checking out.

As big a Miles Davis fan as I am I gotta go with Dizzy. Bird and Diz changed the landscape of music together. Like someone else said - Diz said that Bird was the other half of his heartbeat. Can't have one without the other. It's like chicken without waffles! B)