InstaCollection - The Jazz Classics

InstaCollection! - start or freshen up your jazz collection with DJ Kendo recommendations! Buy downloads for your phone/pc using the handy links below or just load the titles into your favorite music streaming service!

Here you go! This week's installation of the Instacollection features 5 of the

most renowned jazz tracks of all time, just in case you're a newbie to jazz or

Dave Brubeck
photo by William "PoPsie" Randolph

just in case you overlooked one of them! Not to mention it's 37+ minutes of the best jazz for $5.

"Blue Rondo ala Turk" from Dave Brubeck Quartet's deservingly ultra-famous "Time Out" album is both a marvel and a thing of beauty. Highly original usage of 9/8 time is mixed with the blues and performed with grace and coolness. Saxophonist Paul Desmond and Brubeck both demonstrate high musicality and an ease with the (then) new and foreign meter. | Bobby Timmon's gospel infused "Moanin'" took Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers to a new level of stardom. Catchy & memorable with it's "amen" responses, high energy and Blakey's relentless swing groove, making this blowing session a winner. | "Kind of Blue" is the most popular jazz album of all time by the most famous jazz musician of all time. Miles Davis' "So What" also uses call and response, but with a whole new level of subtlety and cool. From Bill Evans/Paul Chambers dramatic opening, to the famous bass riff, on to Coltrane at the height of his own self-discovery, to Miles' economical drama; this cut introduced the whole world to the best facets of modal jazz. | Charles Mingus' "Goodbye Pork Pie Hat" features 3 tenor saxes in tribute to the recently departed Lester Young. Showcasing Mingus' genius for usage of the blues scale over a vast array of harmony, his sharp ability as a bandleader and his firm grasp of jazz past - this tune never loses it's fascinating appeal. | Everything he had been experimenting with, reaching for and discovering came together in John Coltrane's "A Love Supreme: Acknowledgement". Beautiful melodies, intensity, and a spiritual searching mark this track as most people's favorite Coltrane recording, backed with his classic quartet of McCoy Tyner on piano, Elvin Jones on drums and Jimmy Garrison on bass - all giving full support and enthusiasm. Be prepared to have the vocal hook stuck in your head. These tracks will make you something of a expert on what makes jazz so wonderful, as well as someone who is able to recognize the sound of these five jazz household names. Enjoy!