I don't get it

I think Jazz is essentially art as much as it music because of this you have to meet it half way. Another one to try would be Lush Life by JC. I would steer clear of A Love Supreme as it does take some getting, but once got....Overall I think the best place to start would be Ellington, try 'and his mother called him Bill'. If you don't like this then you don't like music!

Although I felt his PBS series "Jazz" left out key details and people, spent way too much time on big bands (and not enough on later works/artists), it also drew my stepfather and a colleague toward jazz, and they are now buying and borrowing music to learn more. It's interesting to see the photos and film clips, and hear from the players who are still alive. It also does a great job of setting the context for some of the "classic" pieces, and showing how players influenced eachother. It can begin to feel a bit like the Wynton Marsalis show, (he's the common thread through it all), but even that is tolerable. Many libraries have either the DVD or VHS version. There's a soundtrack set of CDs also, (5 I think) which might be of interest.

M

...I would still say confidently perhaps 15 years ago. Now I love a lot of music that could be called Jazz. I know what you mean by finding swishy drums kinda cheesy, and much soloing still sounds like someone trying to impress the rest of the band rather than communicating with non-Sax players in the audience. There is some great advice in this thread, especially about going to see live bands and approaching John Coltrane with care. I'm still getting there. I can't offer a Road to Damascus experience (I owned 'Kind of Blue' for about ten years before starting to recognise what I had), I just seemed to listen to more and more and grew to like what I heard. Like beer and sex you can't expect to like everything first time. My way in was through Jamaican intrumental R&B, Ska and Reggae. Great party music with a rock-solid beat and no solo longer than 8 bars! Jazz in all be name but music to jump up and jump around to. Trojan LP's 'Blow Mr Hornsman' and 'Shufflin' on Bond Street' are great introductions, but look for Don Drummond, Tommy McCook, Roland Alphonso or Duke Reid and you can't go far wrong. 'Jazz Jamaica' are keeping the flame burning in the UK and are killer live.

they're warming up and tuning the instruments, doing soundchecks etc. until I put on "Jazz at the Pawnshop"...this has it all and is a perfect jumping off point...start slow, test the water and be careful not to dive in to deep...samo

universal has a sereis called jazz in Paris, there's some nice recordings from when known, even seminal, jazz performers in this series, Baker, Miles, Grappelli, Peterson, Hines et al. It cost a deresory 8€ per disk to test the waters.

I listened to this one last night:

It's mostly a recording of a 10 piece bans, and has some great arrangements, while Lucky Thompson Saxophone style harks back to the prewar bigbans era. I also bought a Stan Getz at the Salle Pleyel recording (1966) which features Garry Burton and Roy Haynes. Roy Haynes really has a great percussive style on the drums.

btw, these recordings are £8 from amazon.co.uk and €8 from amazon.fr.

Peter