# jazz classics rank 'em - no excuses



## science (Oct 14, 2010)

I don't make 'em easy, I just make 'em.

Hot 5s & 7s = Louis Armstrong
Blanton-Webster Band = Duke Ellington
Savoy & Dial Takes = Charlie Parker

>> = "is greater than" or "I like more than" or whatever you're comfortable with


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## lunchdress (Apr 20, 2013)

I'm going with "I like more than", and just by the slightest margin for LA over DE.


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## norman bates (Aug 18, 2010)

my preference at the moment is certainly for ellington


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## Crudblud (Dec 29, 2011)

In terms of jazz I grew up on Parker and Armstrong, and although I'm much more in to Coleman, Dolphy and Ayler these days, those two are still my guys. Ellington, sadly, and despite many attempts, has never really appealed to me.


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

Crudblud said:


> In terms of jazz I grew up on Parker and Armstrong, and although I'm much more in to Coleman, Dolphy and Ayler these days, those two are still my guys. Ellington, sadly, and despite many attempts, has never really appealed to me.


I have the same problem with Ellington. You like Eric Dolphy and Albert Ayler? You're a rare bird. (Me too.)


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## Crudblud (Dec 29, 2011)

Manxfeeder said:


> I have the same problem with Ellington. You like Eric Dolphy and Albert Ayler? You're a rare bird. (Me too.)


Yes! I'd count Out to Lunch and Spiritual Unity among my favourites for certain.


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## Arsakes (Feb 20, 2012)

My vote is obvious up there...
Honorable mention: 
Benny Goodman, Horace Silver and Gershwin.


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

None of the above inspired my initial interest in jazz. It was the music created in the late 50s through the early 80s. Miles, Trane, Joe Henderson, Wayne Shorter, McCoy Tyner, Mingus, Monk, Dolphy, Weather Report, and ECM artists like Metheny, John Abercrombie, Ralph Towner.

But I do love Parker, Ellington, and Satchmo. I've never really spent time listening to the classic Armstrong or Ellington recordings, but I do have the Parker stuff. I love Duke's piano playing, and all his great compositions. And anything with Johnny Hodges on alto.


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## starry (Jun 2, 2009)

I haven't heard these for a bit but my instinct says

Ellington (has variety)
Armstrong
Parker (I like him least)


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Louis Armstrong represents horn-jazz which is based in blues, and vocal-inflected, with growling and bending notes. 

Parker and bebop was "harmonic" music based in rapid solos over complex chord changes, and much of the original blues influence had faded, replaced by a more Westernized model of tin-pan-alley songs written in Western harmonic language on pianos. Horns had to solo quickly, and there was no room for note-bending.

Ellington continues the tin-pan-alley tradition, bypassing the "translation" phase and creating music directly.

Jazz was becoming more and more Westernized, slipping away from its African and blues roots. 

Miles Davis, having gone through be-bop, finally "shook off" the Western trappings of harmonic change, taking it back to a tribal group improvisation over a "groove" or drone. He took back the black man's jazz from players like Bill Evans and Dave Brubeck, and made it a self-determining black form again, bypassing all the "assimilation" jazz tends to absorb. He angered the critics, but so what? Jazz had already been "appropriated" for use by white America, in TV shows and soundtracks, then extra-cultural influences like Bossa Nova. Whose jazz was this, anyway? For Davis, it was still the black man's.


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## norman bates (Aug 18, 2010)

millionrainbows said:


> Miles Davis, having gone through be-bop, finally "shook off" the Western trappings of harmonic change, taking it back to a tribal group improvisation over a "groove" or drone.


I'm not so sure it's exactly like this, because the man behind modal jazz was george russell who was white, and also the first one who wrote a modal piece. While the main bebop composer, Monk had a style that had nothing to do with european influences, and he used a lot of tricky changes. 
And Davis aside Russell collaborated with a lot of musicians who were deeply influenced by european music, gil evans, bill evans, herbie hancock...


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