The Fifty Greatest Jazz Piano Players of All-Time

[AllenLowe]

Actually that's not bad:

1) Irving Berlin - wrote many great songs played by jazz musicians

2) Zez Confrey - excellent rag composer and pianist - as a matter of fact his 1921 recordings are almost identical in sound and feeling and swing to Eubie Blake -

3) Ferde Grofe - great arranger, wrote excellent jazz and jazz/classical pieces for Paul Whiteman

4) George Gershwin - great composer of pop songs, not to mention Concerto in F -

[Brownian Motion]

Actually that's not bad:

1) Irving Berlin - wrote many great songs played by jazz musicians

2) Zez Confrey - excellent rag composer and pianist - as a matter of fact his 1921 recordings are almost identical in sound and feeling and swing to Eubie Blake -

3) Ferde Grofe - great arranger, wrote excellent jazz and jazz/classical pieces for Paul Whiteman

4) George Gershwin - great composer of pop songs, not to mention Concerto in F -

You've made my point. Now tell me your paypal address again.

[JSngry]

What an absolute waste of time.

Ah, but it will serve Massa's purposes quite well...

Marssalis

No, not that Massa. Although he's unwittingly in cahoots with the Massa I'm talking about.

The "this music and these people have a very specific place in my world and anybody and anything what thinks that they and it don't, or think that it's not my world are gonna find out otherwise in no uncertain terms" Massa, that's who I'm talking about.

To which all I can say is - Fuck you, Massa. You can kiss my uppity, self-important, don't give a righteous goddamn about your world ass. You can take you liberation-of-self-by-creating-servitude-for-others bullshit and stick it so far up your ass that it comes out your mouth. Maybe then you can taste it as the pure self-created/self-contaminated taste of death shit that it truly is.

But I doubt it. Some people love the taste of their own shit.

[RDK]

from the table of contents:

1 Oscar Peterson 3

2 Bill Evans 7

3 Bud Powell 11

4 Art Tatum 15

5 Monty Alexander 19

6 Benny Green 23

7 André Previn 27

8 Tommy Flanagan 31

9 George Shearing 35

10 Red Garland 39

11 McCoy Tyner 43

12 Gene Harris 47

13 Kenny Drew 51

14 Hampton Hawes 55

15 Thelonious Monk 59

16 Ahmad Jamal 63

17 Billy Taylor 67

18 Horace Silver 71

19 Hank Jones 75

20 Chick Corea 79

21 Tete Montoliu 83

22 Phineas Newborn, Jr. 87

23 Teddy Wilson 91

24 Nat "King" Cole 95

25 Erroll Garner 99

3 26 Cedar Walton 103

27 Count Basie 107

28 Dave Brubeck 111

29 Cyrus Chestnut 115

30 Lennie Tristano 119

31 Fats Waller 123

32 Dick Hyman 127

33 Wynton Kelly 131

34 Dave McKenna 135

35 John Bunch 139

36 Kenny Barron 143

37 Bobby Timmons 147

38 Duke Ellington 151

39 Earl Hines 155

40 Jimmy Rowles 159

41 Ray Bryant 163

42 Herbie Hancock 167

43 Jelly Roll Morton 171

44 Al Haig 175

45 Derek Smith 179

46 Ralph Sharon 183

47 Mary Lou Williams 187

48 Willie "The Lion" Smith 191

49 Roland Hanna 195

50 Keith Jarrett 199

The problem with a list like this, of course, is that it's really hard to argue that (m)any of these top 50 names don't deserve to be on the list - most of these pianists are pretty damn good. (There are a few, however, that I'm unfamiliar with, such as John Bunch and Derek Smith.) One can definitely argue about the rankings, though, and at least Alexander, Green, and Previn don't belong anywhere near the top 10. And by omitting any of the more "modern" pianists such as Andrew Hill and Cecil Taylor (even though I don't personally care for CT all that much) proves just how conservative the author is in his musical tastes. This is far from a balanced list. And Jarrett down at number 50? Looks like a thrown bone to me.

Anyhow, of these fifty men and women, who would you leave out and who would you replace them with?

[Dan Gould]

Anyhow, of these fifty men and women, who would you leave out and who would you replace them with?

Anyone says "Gene Harris" has got to answer to me.

[neveronfriday]

I like Monty Alexander. Have been getting into his recent stuff, especially the recordings with the former Ray Brown Trio (especially Brown's last recording) and the "Live at the Iridium" CD. Great stuff on there!

Just wanted to put that on record.

[RDK]

Well, my top ten (though in no particular order and not necessarily for their piano playing) would be:

Bill Evans

Keith Jarrett

Thelonious Monk

Bud Powell

Horace Silver

Chick Corea

Herbie Hancock

Duke Ellington

Jaki Byard

Abdullah Ibrahim

[Kalo]

from the table of contents:

1 Oscar Peterson 3

2 Bill Evans 7

3 Bud Powell 11

4 Art Tatum 15

5 Monty Alexander 19

6 Benny Green 23

7 André Previn 27

8 Tommy Flanagan 31

9 George Shearing 35

10 Red Garland 39

What's really striking about this top ten is how few of the players here brought anything truly new to the table. By that criterion, only Tatum, Powell, and Evans qualify. And I think that few would argue that those three belong on any top ten of most important/influential/best jazz pianists.

[Kalo]

Well, my top ten (though in no particular order and not necessarily for their piano playing) would be:

Bill Evans

Keith Jarrett

Thelonious Monk

Bud Powell

Horace Silver

Chick Corea

Herbie Hancock

Duke Ellington

Jaki Byard

Abdullah Ibrahim

Mine would look somewhat different, but this is a heck of a lot better than Rizzo's list!

[birdanddizzy]

I give mine :

Art Tatum

Bill Evans

Wynton Kelly

Oscar Peterson

Bud Powell

Thelonious Monk

Hank Jones

Michel Petrucciani

Martial Solal

...

[BruceH]

Martial Solal

...

One of the main names quite astonishingly missing from the "top 50" list. Talk about "clueless!"

[BruceH]

Here's a game for ya: Try to make a fine "top five" using only names not on the list!

Here's my stab---(no particular order)----

Sonny Clark

Martial Solal

Andrew Hill

Herbie Nichols

Mel Powell