Best fat jazz guitar albums?

Andy Volk · Post by **Andy Volk** » 18 Jul 2006 12:00 pm

Dave wrote practically my whole list! There are some budget bin recordings from the European tour Wes & Johhny Griffin did in the mid 60s. Towering jazz guitar playing.

- My favorite Tal albums are Autumn in New York, The Tal Farlow album, The Swinging Guitar of Tal Farlow. The interplay on the Red Norvo trio records is great but not quite as artistically satisfying.
- Joe Pass: For Django, Virtuoso #1 (they whole virtuoso series is good but #1 is best) duet album with Ella, Live at Yoshi's, Carter Gillespie & Company (fantastic playing from Dizzy G., Benny Carter & Joe)
- Ed Bickert: Dance to The Lady. On vinyl but well worth hearing iduet album with Don Thompson
- Gabor Szabo: Spellbinder & Sorcerer
- Complete Jim Hall/Paul Desmond on RCA is sublime
- Sal Salvador's early records are good
- Barney Kessel: On Fire (Japanese reissue) is great in addition to the ones noted by Dave.
- Tom Morrell's Pteradactyl Ptales #4 has some scorchingly great jazz guitar from Clint Strong (not to mention some of Tom's best soloing on record).
- I could go on and on!

Stephen Gregory · Post by **Stephen Gregory** » 18 Jul 2006 12:05 pm

HANK GARLAND!!!

Charles Davidson · Post by **Charles Davidson** » 18 Jul 2006 7:32 pm

Right on Stephen,Hank WAS the man.Once heard George Benson say,Jazz Winds was his biggest influence.

Chris Forbes · Post by **Chris Forbes** » 19 Jul 2006 2:47 am

Mr. Volk, are there publically released albums of that Wes and Johnny Griffin tour? I would LOVE to get my greasy little mitts on some of that stuff!!!!
Mr. McGann, thank for agreeing with me, I too think Full House is one of the ALL-TIME jazz classics.

Mike Perlowin RIP · Post by **Mike Perlowin RIP** » 19 Jul 2006 3:35 am

One name that should be included is Charlie Byrd. Byrd made a lot of elevator music records during the years he was with Columbia records, but he did some really cool things both before and after.

Amomg his best:

Blues For night People (Savoy)
Blues Sonata (Riveside)
Mr. Guitar (Riverside)
Live at the Village Vanguard (Riverside)
Byrd By The Sea (Fantasy)

Byrd By the Sea is a live album. I was in the audience when it was recorded.

Byrd is joined by a pianist on a few tunes on Blues Sonata. Aside from those 3 or 4 tunes, the rest of that album, and all the others listed are just the trio: guitar, bass and drums, with none of the MOR production that marred his Columbia recordings.

Blues For Night People has not been reissued on CD. The rest should be available.

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Warning: I have a telecaster and I'm not afraid to use it.
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My web site

[This message was edited by Mike Perlowin on 19 July 2006 at 04:40 AM.]

Andy Volk · Post by **Andy Volk** » 19 Jul 2006 5:38 am

Not sure if Johnny Griffin's on this but Wes is in amazing form and Harold Mabern's piano work is also outstanding:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000BPN268/qid=1153316728/sr=1-22/ref=sr_1_22/104-8586300-0911121?s=music&v=glance&n=5174

Michael Johnstone · Post by **Michael Johnstone** » 19 Jul 2006 6:28 am

Ted Greene - "Solo Guitar"
Ted was in a class by himself.

Michael Lee Allen · Post by **Michael Lee Allen** » 19 Jul 2006 8:50 am

Deleted.

Andy Volk · Post by **Andy Volk** » 19 Jul 2006 10:12 am

George Barnes' Concord CDs are also very good.My favorite is "Plays So Good." "Don't Get Around Much Anymore" on David Grisman's Acoustic Disclabel is good too. George is really underated. His single note playing rocks and swings like a clarinet.

Ted Greene's album IS great (except for the Leslie rotating speaker sound). George Van Eps was a big influence on Ted. Check out his playing; his mastery of chord melody with moving inner voices is astounding.

Post by **Dave Mudgett** » 19 Jul 2006 10:55 am

I concur on George Barnes, Ted Greene, and George Van Eps, and Sal Salvador. George Barnes also played a lot of commercial sessions - rockabilly, country, and so on. To me, Van Eps is the classic master of chord melody.

A great single-string specialist we've missed is Herb Ellis. "Stan Getz and the Oscar Peterson Trio" on Verve, and "Great Guitars", with Charlie Byrd, Barney Kessel, and Herb Ellis feature quite a bit of Herb's playing. He also played on a lot of other peoples' sessions.

Of course, we should hardly have to mention Charlie Christian. "The Genius of the Electric Guitar" and "The Benny Goodman Sextet, featuring Charlie Christian" Columbia reissues are great. The sessions at Minton's with Monk and Diz are sonically rough but great.

I also like the Gabor Szabo records mentioned, in a somewhat different tonal vein. Similarly, Bola Sete's old Fantasy records are good in a Latin vein.

Of course, I missed Jim Hall's work with Paul Desmond. Great stuff. I only have one LP of this, but it's great, to my tastes.

Every once in a while, I go into a vintage record shop and just look through the racks to see what they have. Some cool but relatively obscure stuff has not been reissued, and I sometimes am able to pick up some real cool vinyl pretty inexpensively. CD reissues are great, but vinyl is still cool and often a lot less expensive - not all the time, but sometimes. IMO, of course.

Jody Carver · Post by **Jody Carver** » 19 Jul 2006 2:40 pm

Ten Tuff Guitars

Columbia Records featuring 10 of New York's greatest studio guitar players. Led by Bucky Pizzerelli and Tony Mottola, Al Caiola and others. Yup Toot's Theilman as well.[This message was edited by Jody Carver on 19 July 2006 at 03:50 PM.]

Tom Zielinski · Post by **Tom Zielinski** » 19 Jul 2006 4:42 pm

Joe Pass: Live at Donte's
Joe Pass: Seven Come Eleven

Johnny Smith: Walk Dont Run (he wrote it!, not the ventures!)

Wes Montgomery Full House

Pat Martino, Live, Consciousness

The very underrated Howard Roberts Magic Band

The very underrated Oscar Moore with Nat King Coles Trio

Cal Collins, if you can find the vinyl for "Cross Country", "By Myself" and "Blues on my mind". He did a bit of country jazz and solo guitar. Some sounds like Joe Pass with a bit of fingerpickin in it. I burned all my vinyl to disc if you are interested! I should redo it now that I have a better equipped studio.

Andy Volk · Post by **Andy Volk** » 19 Jul 2006 6:01 pm

Herb Ellis was purposely off my list. I've heard him on countless records and in person and his jazz playing just doesn't do it for me and I'm not 100% sure why.

Brint Hannay · Post by **Brint Hannay** » 19 Jul 2006 8:41 pm

The stuff by "The Great Guitars" (Barney Kessel, Herb Ellis, and Charlie Byrd) is pretty phenomenal, especially "Live at the Winery". They really seemed to bring out the best in eachother--and that's saying something! Kessel in particular just smokes!
Charlie Byrd had an album on Savoy called "Jazz Recital" that's as good as the ones Mike P. mentioned. It features a couple of tunes on electric archtop, including "Homage to Charlie Christian", which Danny Gatton covered on "Unfinished Business". ("Blues Sonata" had a whole side on electric. Ah, the old days, when records had "sides"!)
Also not yet mentioned (I think), George Benson's early stuff on CTI, before he got into the vocal thing, is pretty hot. I recommend "Beyond the Blue Horizon" and "Body Talk".

Chris Forbes · Post by **Chris Forbes** » 20 Jul 2006 2:48 am

Speaking of the Great Guitars, thank you again Brint!!!! I can testify that "Live at the Winery" is a supercalifragalitsticexpialidocious album from front to back.

Adrienne Clasky · Post by **Adrienne Clasky** » 20 Jul 2006 3:43 pm

Anthony Wilson: Adult Themes.

It gestures towards the past, but is wholly grounded in the contemporary. Plus, Wilson is brilliant. (That helps! LOL)

Frank Estes · Post by **Frank Estes** » 20 Jul 2006 8:58 pm

When I was at Xavier University (around the mid 1990s), Calvin Newborn did a little concert and it was just him and a standup bass. I really enjoyed it and probably have a copy of the performance on VHS somewhere as they replayed it on local TV in Cincinnati.

Anyway you can check him out:
http://yellowdogrecords.com/calvinnewborn/

Mark van Allen · Post by **Mark van Allen** » 25 Jul 2006 3:41 pm

Lots of great suggestions here.
Charlie Christian for sure- for one thing, almost everything he played lays well on C6th!
And definitely get hold of Mark Whitfield's self-titled first CD. great stuff in the Benson vein.

Post by **Dave Mudgett** » 25 Jul 2006 8:10 pm

One of my favorite vinyl record shops is going out of business tomorrow, so I went down to grab up everything cool I could find today - I picked up several cool jazz guitar LPs, but this one really stands out: "Seven, Come Eleven" with Herb Ellis, Joe Pass, Jake Hanna, and Ray Brown, on Concord Jazz, live at the Concord Jazz Festival, 1974. Herb and Joe just sound great together, and of course Ray Brown doesn't hurt anything either.

I know some jazz guitar players who are critical of Herb because he is more focused on single-string than most, and the jazz guitar mainstream is really into the chord melody thing. He approaches it more like a horn player and also has a brighter-than-typical tone. But he just burns it up on this record, to my taste. I hear so many shades of Charlie Christian, but I can usually tell it's Herb right away - he has a distinctive sound. I saw him live several times also - as usual, it's a matter of personal taste.

PS - a cool CD in the same trip - Jack McDuff, "The Honeydripper", with Grant Green on guitar and Jimmy "Night Train" Forrest on tenor, on Prestige, original recording 1961. This is Grant's first major recording. If this ain't "fat, dirty jazz", I don't know what is. I agree on McDuff with George Benson also - McDuff was off my list because most of the stuff I have is later 70s stuff that is not to the same standard, IMO. But the earlier stuff is great. I have an old 45 RPM of McDuff and Benson "Rock Candy" - great.[This message was edited by Dave Mudgett on 25 July 2006 at 09:20 PM.]

Tom Zielinski · Post by **Tom Zielinski** » 25 Jul 2006 8:25 pm

Hey I noticed someone mentioned George Barnes! I forgot about him. I have a great rare Lp called "country jazz" that has some real hot playing. I even burned it to cd a while ago.

Freddie Green with Count Basie laid down some great rhythm too. His solo disc is cool too.

Like some, I am not a Herb Ellis fan, but the chemistry with Joe Pass is great on 7 come 11. Joe also sounds really good on the Basie Jam 1-3 albums for blues. "mama don't wear no drawers" is pretty cool!

Jussi Huhtakangas · Post by **Jussi Huhtakangas** » 26 Jul 2006 12:36 am

Tom, I have that Country Jazz LP too, it's pretty hard to come by and not too many people even know about that album by Barnes. It's one of my favorite George Barnes albums.
Another rarely mentioned albums are Wild Kitten by Joe Puma and Message From Garcia by Dick Garcia, both on Dawn label. They've been reissued on cd, but even those are hard to find today, but well worth checkin' out. And you can't go wrong with Chuck Wayne; his String Fever LP has been recently reissued on cd and the early Savoy recordings too, though that one might be harder to find. Some great Chuck Wayne back up work is on Tony Bennett's Cloud 9 LP which is easy to find on a midprice cd, it's my favorite Tony album.
More great back up work can be found on Julie London's first two albums Julie Is Her Name vol 1 & 2. Both albums only feature Julie, guitar and upright bass. Some of the most intimate mood music you can find. Barney Kessel on vol 1 and Howard Roberts on vol.2. Can be found on cd with both albums on one cd.

Andy Volk · Post by **Andy Volk** » 26 Jul 2006 2:50 am

One of my sleeper favorites is a George Golla from Australia. He's European but has been in Oz for years. He plays really exciting chord solo style - kind of like Bucky Pizzarelli and Marty Grosz. Live at Sydeny Opera House with the great wind player Don Burrows is fantastic.

Danny Gatton was a big fan of Barnes' Country Jazz. The Complete Standard Transcriptions is a fascinating Barnes record that's a bit like Raymond Scott's cartoon music. Barnes led a swinging group of woodwinds and electric guitar on radio in the 40s. This record has things like swinging versions of nursery rhymes with amazing Barnes solos as part of his tight ensemble arrangements.

I've heard the Pass/Ellis records and for my taste, they were like oil & water. Ellis sucked the poetry away from Pass's playing. Just my opinion. Ellis did a record with Charlie Byrd called Guitar Guitar! that surprisingly seemed to work well. Years later, he was one of the founders of the Great Guitars with Kessel & Ellis.

Speaking of Kessel, the three way interplay on the Poll Winners albums bewteen Kessel, Mann, and Brown is near telepathic 'cause they were such good friends but there's also a mid 60s trio record called On Fire with Barney and a pick-up group. His playing is phenomanally exciting - even more so than the classic Poll Winners records. He didn't have a prior relationship with the other players so he just came out of the gate like a fire-breathing racehorse. Last I looked, it was only available on CD from Japan.

Found one dealer here: http://www.ejazzlines.com/c2/BARNEY-KESSEL-ON-FIRE-p44158.html [This message was edited by Andy Volk on 26 July 2006 at 02:01 PM.]

Jeff Agnew · Post by **Jeff Agnew** » 26 Jul 2006 4:21 am

I'd like to thank all of you for pointing me to several CDs I was either unaware of or had overlooked these many years. I've since ordered several and it's always nice to know there is still great music out there that sometimes we just haven't found yet.

Regarding Andy's feeling on Herb -- I'd love to know what it is that he can't describe because I can't either. I certainly don't fault his talent. It's just that, for me, there's something missing. It's not necessarily the lack of a chordal approach or the tone (though I acknowledge those factors).

Ironically, I got to hear Herb regularly in the 80s when he would often stop by to rehearse or jam with the US Navy's big band jazz ensemble. He and their guitar player were buds and got together for shows or jams frequently. I'd come out of my rehearsal room across the hall and they'd be tearing it up. Herb fit in well with those guys for some reason and I enjoyed every minute of it. Probably because compared to the Top 40 country junk food I was playing at the time it was filet mignon. But then I'd hear him with the Great Guitars at Charlie's club in Annapolis and... the emptiness was back.

All of which is not to disparage Herb or those who love his playing. As with Andy, I can't describe why it doesn't do much for me and I wish I knew why.

But enough of Herb. What do you guys think about Jerry Garcia?

Barry Blackwood · Post by **Barry Blackwood** » 26 Jul 2006 12:48 pm

Although I'm a little late to the party, Hank Garland and Howard Roberts get my vote as well.

Rick Jolley · Post by **Rick Jolley** » 26 Jul 2006 7:08 pm

I subscribe to the Rhapsody service of RealPlayer. It costs $9.95 a month, which is charged to my AMEX account. I thought it was a little pricey a couple of years ago when I first subscribed, but it has gotten better and better, in terms of the good jazz stuff they have.

For instance, they have recently added just about all of Barney Kessel's old recordings (one of my primary influences.)

Downloads for recording cost 69 cents each, but with my DSL, I can get to everything without putting it on my hard drive <big grin> so I just go use it as is.

My son, a jazz accordion and keyboard player, stays up after I go to bed and plays stuff on the headphones.

When I started seriously studying Dobro, their dobro list was really a big help.

Worth a look -- I think they have a trial subscription.
http://www.rhapsody.com

Rickey Zahn