Of course, such a thing would be nearly impossible to declare.  I could not even tell you for certain which jazz album in my own collection would be my vote for Greatest Jazz Album of All Time.  “Kind of Blue” would be up there, but then there’s “Somethin’ Else” the Cannonball Adderly album I love quite dearly.  Then there’s the Dave Brubeck albums I enjoy. 

In short, it would be almost impossible.

However, there are plenty of peope willing to make more lists.  Some of them are willing to go up to 100 albums and/or DVDs and other media in their lists of Greatest Jazz Albums of All-Time.

1.  http://home.austarnet.com.au/petersykes/jazz100/   – an interesting list, if fairly standard.  I found few surprises here.

2.  http://100greatestjazzalbums.blogspot.com/  Another site dedicated to jazz.  While it claims to be the 100 of all time, it also appears to give general jazz album information and opinion.

3.  http://forums.allaboutjazz.com/showthread.php?t=15785  I think I’ve written about this one before and perhaps provided the link.  The entire website is interesting for any jazz fan.

4.  http://www.reitzes.com/jazzbestef.html - this is an intriguing list because it isn’t in a numerical order.  It’s a best-of list in alphabetical order, which saves the writer having to declare an album “number 1.”

5.  http://www.amazon.com/Best-Jazz-Albums-All-Time/lm/GJRMYWCWWVX8  Amazon.com is becoming the King of the Lists.  They encourage lists by those who have memberships.  This author puts Coltrane’s “Blue Train” album at number one with “Kind of Blue” second.  Needless to say, I would disagree.

So, there you go.  Leave it to me to give you a list of the lists.  Actually, this barely scratches the surface. 

Post from: Jazz & Blues Lounge

Of course, the East Coast news people go exactly the opposite way.  It only becomes news to them when it actually hits New York.  Chicago COULD have been wiped out by a freak snow fall and they wouldn’t notice or acknowledge it until the giant snow balls were rolling down 5th Avenue.

It turned out that it did indeed snow.  Then it rained.  Then it was freezing rain.  When I went to bed last night, it looked like everything outside was encased in plastic.  Then, when I woke up, a freak warm front had gone through and much of the ice had melted and it rained all day.  Then the weather people came on during the Bears game to scream that the melted ice w0uld re-freeze tonight.

People, we live in Chicago.  We should all be used to this by now.  Unless you just moved here from a life living on the equator, none of this should be a surprise to you.  You should also all learn how to drive in this stuff or else get off the road so I can get past you in my Jeep.

Sorry, I realize this has nothing to do with jazz.  As such, I suggest you go back to the top, and start reading it again with the Smooth Jazz song “New Snow” by Flim and the BBs playing.  Yeah, sure, it may be hard to find that song and the song itself may be the audio equivalent of a marshmallow dipped in honey…

But when the tenuous connections get tough, the tough dig up the elevator music.

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Of course, Chip and other purists will be quick to point out there are a lot more than two types of jazz.  I know that.  There’s Latin jazz and other forms of jazz from around the world.  New Orleans jazz is just a little different than Chicago jazz and on and on it goes.

For me, the two types of jazz are classic jazz and the new Smooth Jazz that you hear on most commercial jazz radio stations like WNUA.

I am a fan of classic jazz.  For me, this includes all of the forms of jazz I mentioned before in that list of jazz genres.  Any jazz that has horns and sounds like something you would hear from Gillespie, Davis or Parker is classic jazz as far as I am concerned.

WNUA plays mostly Smooth Jazz.  For me, there is nothing very musical or enjoyable about this type of music.  It is bland.  It is electronic.  It lacks all of the soul and passion of a Miles Davis riff or a Charles Mingus’ “Haitian Fight Song.”  It sounds, to me, like the kind of stuff that plays in the background while the dentist grinds your teeth or the stuff that plays in the background, slowly melting your brain, while you read old and outdated magazines in your doctor’s office.

Still, even I have drifted.  My own CD and music collection, in addition to the Miles Davis and John Coltrane, also has Tom Scott, David Sandborn and a group called Flim and the BBs.  So, even I can slip up.

I am not embarassed by that, though.  I celebrate the fact that this country and this genre is so diverse that it makes room for Wynton Marsalis and Kenny G.  I prefer to listen to Wynton, but if Kenny manages to crank out a good tune (it has yet to happen, as far as I know) I would give it a listen and maybe even download it.

So, for those of you wanting to listen to cool jazz sounds in Chicago, you can listen to two radio stations online.  The first is WDCB and the second is WNUA.  If you Google them you’ll find how to listen to them online.

Celebrate diversity.

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Still, I hate to leave you all for days without something new.  As such, I have a couple of links for you.  The first one has NOTHING to do with jazz or blues.  It is just, without a doubt, about the funniest damn thing I have seen in a long time.  I had a friend forward this to me and it had me laughing so hard I feared I would pass out from lack of oxygen.  It is some crazy music video from India that someone has made up some subtitles to.   So, this is just for laughs and not at all in keeping with the theme of this blog.

To see it click here.

The second thing I wanted to point out is this website that I have come to love.  Now, in my wildest dreams, this blog would be everything that is at this website.  However, since I am but one man, that is just not entirely possible.  They seem to have contributing writers from all over the place and I am trying to cover this large musical spectrum by myself and with help from Chip.

It is called JazzReview.com.  They have an extensive listing of concerts, articles, interviews and reviews.  Plus they even tell you which jazz MP3s you should be downloading.  It has a coolness factor about it I can still only aspire to.

So, I hope you have a great weekend.  I hope you laugh at the first link and then satisfy your jazz cravings with the second.  Most importantly, I hope you come back and visit soon.

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Terence was born in 1962 in New Orleans.  He is a man who plays the trumpet and, man, can he play.  When it comes to modern horn players, there are a select few I would consider lumping in with the classic horn players like Dizzy and Miles.  Terence would be one of those.

Terence was asked to score the documentary about the aftermath of Hurrican Katrina produced and directed by Spike Lee called “When the Levees Broke.”  It is a movie that will make you mad and it doesn’t matter what race or color you are.

That in turn inspired Terence to do an album and that album came out August 14.  It is a very, very powerful album from Blue Note records (www.bluenote.com).  The album is called “A Tale of God’s Will (A Reqiuem for Katrina).

The man manages to play his horn in such a way that you can palpably feel the anger, frustration and profound sadness of seeing the city where he was born and the state it is in currently.  It is a profound experience that shows you how even just music, when in the hands of a true talent, can evoke powerful emotions.  You don’t need lyrics to feel anger and empathy.

I downloaded the albume through iTunes myself and have been playing it almost non-stop as I write.  It is available at any music store as well as Blue Notes’ website and through Amazon.com. 

No matter what your political beliefs or you particular status as either a wealthy person, poor person, middle class, black or white, you should feel anger over the destruction of New Orleans.  One of America’s greatest cities is still in ruins and it’s been two years.  That is a sad thing.

For a perfect feeling of that anger, frustration and sadness, take a listen to Terence Blanchard’s new album “A Tale of God’s Will (A Reqiuem for Katrina).”  Not only is the music powerful and impressive, but the message is important too.

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