few questions for anyone who would know

[music_is_pornography]

I am a musician who recently got into jazz. I love what I have heard but I am experiencing much difficulty branching out. I listen to a lot of Thelonious Monk, Bill Evans, Miles Davis, Django Reinhardt, and Dave Brubeck.

I have heard very little other than "mainstream" jazz. I'm asking for someone to point me in the right direction and makes some reccomendations. I have little knowlege of anything contemporary or obscure. Any suggestions would be greatly appriciated

[Fran]

My question is "what is the square root of your wierd screen name?"

[sheila]

Try EST, The Bad Plus, Ornette Coleman, Cecil Taylor, Archie Shepp's records from the sixties, Nils Petter Molvaer, Ken Vandermark - all these are a little off the mainstream, but accesible and exciting music.

[PDEE]

Originally posted by music_is_pornography
I am a musician who recently got into jazz. I love what I have heard but I am experiencing much difficulty branching out. I listen to a lot of Thelonious Monk, Bill Evans, Miles Davis, Django Reinhardt, and Dave Brubeck.

I have heard very little other than "mainstream" jazz. I'm asking for someone to point me in the right direction and makes some reccomendations. I have little knowlege of anything contemporary or obscure. Any suggestions would be greatly appriciated

:D Stanley Dance, who is credited with coining the term Mainstream stated that it was the only category of Jazz that kept on growing.( expanding might have been better)

At the time Monk,Evans, Davis and Brubeck were solidly in the Modern Jazz category, while Django fell into the Traditional camp. It's somewhat :D to see the usage of such terms these days. Perehaps I should ressurect the Jazz Taxonomy thread:rolleyes:

And I know what Duke Ellington said...... but it's not true:D

[music_is_pornography]

I actually recently got the bad plus album Give, as well as Coleman's shape of jazz to come and free jazz (which I am listening to now)

thanks for the replies. I have gotten a few names already from reading other threads

[Katzman]

Don't stop listening to the classics. Louis Armstrong's 1929 recording of 'I can't give you anything but love', Django Reinhardt's 1938 recording of 'When day is done', Charlie Parker with strings, Sonny Rollins 'Saxophone collosous', John Coltrane's 'Love Supreme'. These are recording's to meditate on for many years. Listen to everything, but keep the classics at the heart of your jazz appreciation. After all these are the reference points for everything else, these are common ground, these constitute the language of Jazz.

Futhermore, it takes loads of time to listen (as opposed to just hearing) all the classic records. I am a massive Django fan yet I am far from having listened to all his recordings, let alone felt that I have to move on from them.