styles of jazz

[cgrahams]

Hi, I am very much a newbie. I have no idea as to what style is what really. Some of what I listen to and ABSOLUTELY LOVE has been:Coltrane(Blue Train,Love Supreme,Live at Birdland,The Paris Concert),Davis(Kind of Blue,Bitches Brew),Wayne Shorter(Speak No Evil),Wes Montgomery......but I don't even know what categories the music falls into. Any good learning resources for this?

Cheers,
Chris

[bubber]

I'm not sure I'm able to tell you exactly the "category" of the music you mention, except that they all belong to kind of modern mainstream. (Reading another thread "What is Contemporary Jazz" you'll see that categories are problematic because people don't always have the same understanding of them).

I think, however, that you'll find some information and answers by going through the "starter kit" you'll find on top of the "New to Jazz" column here.

[marvin g]

Contemporary jazz as of recently as been associated with Smooth Jazz or Urban Comtemporary Jazz. Hard Bop and bop runs generally together and be-bop preceded both. Avant garde and free jazz generally runs together. Acid Jazz is usually associated with Soul Jazz which may or may not have an organ it. Electric/Fusion jazz is usually late 60's early 70's music. Modern jazz usually involved alot of standards with a small amount of improvasation. Straight ahead jazz is usually a generic term used as a opposite to Smooth jazz. Then you have jazz vocals which is different from pop vocal with a jazzy band.

Now I may be wrong but that's the way it has been explained to me. I'm sure someone on this board will correct my errors. :)

[Seba]

my opinion:

Coltrane: hardbop (at least the albums you mentioned)
Kind of Blue: begin of post-bop
Bitches Brew: fusion
Speak no evil: defenitely post-bop

[Noah Peterson]

I mostly agree with Seba.

Love Supreme is free jazz though.