What Artist/LP/CD Got You Hooked On Jazz

[Pete C]

I remember that Grover Washington (Mr. Magic) and Stanley Turrentine (CTI recordings) got me interested enough in jazz to start looking in the back catalog.

I never would have guessed. Where does that fit chronologically with your pursuit of blues, soul/R&B and gospel?

[cih]

Lots of separate ‘moments’, but one I remember - kind of in secret as a young teenager (I didn’t know then, and still don’t know anybody else with any interest in blues or jazz) I bought a Cab Calloway cassette after seeing what I guess was the Max Fleischer animation of Minnie the Moocher - it gave me the creeps in a good way. On that cassette was Pickin the Cabbage, and along with Benny Goodman’s Clarinet A La King taped from a jazz show on the radio - so I had two jazz tunes I listened to repeatedly.. much later I got heavily into pre-war blues and perhaps an inevitable jazz interest developed as an undercurrent.

Edited May 21, 2012 by cih

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

I started off buying the MJQ in 1960 - 'One never knows', 'Music Inn vol 2' & 'Pyramid'. And Chris Connor. But at the same time, there was Ray Charles - 'What'd I say', 'At Newport' and 'Fathead'. (But also Goodman, Armstrong, Ella, and Duke. Then later, there was more Ray, Nat Adderley, but also Basie, Miles, Jacques Loussier (YES!).

But all the time, I'd go into listening booths with a Blue Note LP (very expensive) and something locally manufactured for about half the price and listen to Jimmy Smith, Lou Donaldson, Freddie Roach, whihch I couldn't afford, then buy the cheaper album. I bought Blue Note on 45s. Also on 45, Jimmy McGriff, Phil UPchurch, Bill DOggett, Hank Jacobs and Harold Betters. But I wouldn't say that in the early 60s I was HOOKED on jazz. I was hooked on R&B and viewed all this jazz I really liked as a kind of R&B. But, by the mid-sixties, much soul was formulaic and driven by the likes of Motown, while I started working an 84 hour week in a textile factory and had enough money to buy Blue Notes. So I really got hooked when I heard Grant Green, John Patton and Ben Dixon on 'Good gracious'. I'd bought the album, played it a bit, then really got into it one evening while I was doing the washing up and kind of opened up my mind without thinking much. That would have been late '65.

MG

[johnlitweiler]

There's a generation gap here. ... The South Bend record stores / departments had listening booths where I could pretend to be a customer and hear 45s - Bessie Smith, JRM, Armstrong Hot 5 reissues. Al Smith's Record Bar ("The House of Jazz" IIRC) was downtown and even advertised in Down Beat.

Yes I guess there is. Record stores like this - including listening booths - just weren't around anymore (least of all over here) by the time most of us "young(ish) uns" got into jazz.

Great. Steve, where did you find that photo? That's his old store on Michigan Street. I can almost smell the cigarettes.

[johnlitweiler]

There's a generation gap here. ... The South Bend record stores / departments had listening booths where I could pretend to be a customer and hear 45s - Bessie Smith, JRM, Armstrong Hot 5 reissues. Al Smith's Record Bar ("The House of Jazz" IIRC) was downtown and even advertised in Down Beat.

Yes I guess there is. Record stores like this - including listening booths - just weren't around anymore (least of all over here) by the time most of us "young(ish) uns" got into jazz.

Great. Steve, where did you find that photo? That's his old store on Michigan Street. I can almost smell the cigarettes.

[John L]

I remember that Grover Washington (Mr. Magic) and Stanley Turrentine (CTI recordings) got me interested enough in jazz to start looking in the back catalog.

I never would have guessed. Where does that fit chronologically with your pursuit of blues, soul/R&B and gospel?

Pete - At the time, I was listening mostly to soul/R&B, with a little bit of rock and blues as well. Grover Washington and Stanley Turrentine were getting play on FM R&B stations, as well as getting spun at parties that I was going to. Even though I already loved the blues back then, my deeper interest in vintage blues and gospel actually followed my initial fascination with jazz.

[NIS]

Somewhere in the far reaches of my age addled brain I have a memory of the Modern Jazz Quartet playing on one of those 1950's TV variety shows. I kind of remember thinking the music was pretty good and what is that guy beating on. I don't know if I was hooked on jazz but I'm still a big fan of the vibe.

[Valeria Victrix]

Great idea for a thread!

Here's mine (a cassette copy from the vinyl which my uncle made for me)

Just about played this one to death. Still love it dearly.

[jeffcrom]

Great idea for a thread!

Here's mine (a cassette copy from the vinyl which my uncle made for me)

Just about played this one to death. Still love it dearly.

An ECM?!? Please turn in your Organissimo Forum membership card immediately!

[Valeria Victrix]

Great idea for a thread!

Here's mine (a cassette copy from the vinyl which my uncle made for me)

Just about played this one to death. Still love it dearly.

An ECM?!? Please turn in your Organissimo Forum membership card immediately!

Yikes! (Backing slowly away...)

Thanks for the warning mate!

[tjluke68]

While working for a music marketing company in '97 or '98, I grabbed a copy of The Artistry of Freddie Hubbard and was hooked from there...

[Big Beat Steve]

There's a generation gap here. ... The South Bend record stores / departments had listening booths where I could pretend to be a customer and hear 45s - Bessie Smith, JRM, Armstrong Hot 5 reissues. Al Smith's Record Bar ("The House of Jazz" IIRC) was downtown and even advertised in Down Beat.

Yes I guess there is. Record stores like this - including listening booths - just weren't around anymore (least of all over here) by the time most of us "young(ish) uns" got into jazz.

Great. Steve, where did you find that photo? That's his old store on Michigan Street. I can almost smell the cigarettes.

Actually that photo is on page 2 of that 74-page 1952 catalog of which the front page is also included.

I won that catalog on eBay about 10 years ago at a pretty good price (for my wallet). And the lists and prices inside (and of course that shop photo) make you wish for a time machine ...

[Roundsound]

I was listening to Miles Davis Blackhawk CD when it the exchanges between Wynton Kelly's comping and Miles' leads struck me. I then became very interested in Miles Davis, which led me to Trane, Bill Evans, and Cannonball. Shortly after, the book "Hard Bop" came out, which gave me information as to other great artists. For about 10 years, I could only listen to jazz. I collected everything I could find. Then for old times sake, I bought a Grateful Dead concert from their '72 Europe tour. I expanded my horizons with rock etc. I listen about 50/50 to jazz and rock now.

[B. Clugston]

As a young kid, I liked it when my dad played Dave Brubeck's Greatest Hits and Paul Desmond's Live and I was fascinated by the different approaches to "Take Five" on each.

Soft Machine's Third was certainly a launching pad towards jazz, but Miles Davis' Bitches Brew and At Fillmore East were the albums that really got me hooked.

[sidewinder]

But when I bought an Esquire EP with two tracks from Donald Byrd's Byrd's Eye View and heard 'Hank's Other Tune' I was knocked out and that's how it started.

Those Esquire EPs are pretty neat John - I have a couple of them (a couple of the McLean's and a Coltrane). Other than the MJQs, they can be pretty rare !

[clifford_thornton]

Mine started out kinda weird. I grew up with jazz around the house - my dad's an avocational pianist - but it never really took. It wasn't until college that I got into it, and was curiously flipping through the bins. I picked out Coltrane's Expression and Ayler's Bells & Prophecy, both on Base LPs. Never heard anything like it before and that stuff changed my life. Sun Ship, ALS, Spiritual Unity, Dolphy and Taylor quickly followed. And then more straight-ahead stuff came later.

[BillF]

But when I bought an Esquire EP with two tracks from Donald Byrd's Byrd's Eye View and heard 'Hank's Other Tune' I was knocked out and that's how it started.

Those Esquire EPs are pretty neat John - I have a couple of them (a couple of the McLean's and a Coltrane). Other than the MJQs, they can be pretty rare !

I have this one:

plus EP 75 Thelonious Monk Trio. No picture available - as you say, pretty rare!

[AfricaBrass]

When I was 18, one of my favorite bands was the Byrds. I read that their song "Eight Miles High" was strongly influenced by John Coltrane, especially his "Africa Brass" album. I purchased the "Africa Brass" cd and fell in love. The next day, I purchased Coltrane's "Impressions", Charles Mingus' "Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus Mingus" and "Bitches Brew" by Miles Davis. From then on, for the next 18 years, jazz became a huge part of my life.

[Chuck Nessa]

Not that it is important to anyone but me, I want to add Monk's Music. This is probably the first jazz record memorized. Monk, Hawk, Coltrane, Ware, Blakey - whooooo Jack!

[bigtiny]

As a young trumpet player in the early 70's who knew NOTHING about jazz, two things happened:

-my new band director played Maynard Ferguson's 'MF Horn II' for me

-my mother, bless her heart, who knew nothing about jazz, knew that I played trumpet and was getting interested in it (via the Maynard incident above) so she

bought me an album from her Columbia Record Club subscription -- Freddie Hubbard's 'First Light', still one of my favorite albums. Yeah, it's 'produced', but

the production and playing are excellent and Freddie just plays his ass off on it.

bigtiny

[JamesJazz]

Sun Ra

I experienced the Arkestra at Detroit's Grande Ballroom one night in 1968. Next day I went out and found "The Heliocentric Worlds of Sun Ra" on ESP, and was quickly sucked into the jazz vortex...

I began to carry jazz LP's with me and tried to "enlighten" my psychedelic brothers, to no avail. I ended up with new friends!

[Hot Ptah]

I liked the Mahavishnu Orchestra's Inner Mounting Flame and Birds of Fire.

I could not appreciate or enjoy acoustic jazz until I heard McCoy Tyner's Trident album. During my first listen to Side One of Trident, the doors flew open.

[T.D.]

Listened occasionally to jazz for decades, started with Miles and Mahavishnu. Miles was the mainstay for a long time.

What got me "hooked" (in the sense of drastically increasing jazz listening, and only quite recently) is music of Tadd Dameron. Was listening to a Proper "Bebop Spoken Here" box, and the included Dameron tunes made a huge impression. That started a more "systematic" exploration of jazz (and big acquisitions of recordings...).

[Pete C]

I could not appreciate or enjoy acoustic jazz until I heard McCoy Tyner's Trident album. During my first listen to Side One of Trident, the doors flew open.

Nine out of ten dentists recommend that Tyner album to their patients who chew gum.

[aparxa]

Fall 2001:

Thelonious Monk Trio