Looking for a place to start with Afro-Cuban jazz? Pick up the one that’s actually called Afro-Cuban. It’s a consistent and melodic set, the contents of which span from romantic balladry (“Lotus Flower”) to percussion heavy Latin jam sessions (“ Minor’s Holiday“). Dorham’s eight-piece combo - which includes the likes of fellow Blue Note alums pianist Horace Silver, drummer Art Blakey and saxophonist Hank Mobley (!) - has a big-band feel, and the arrangements burst with energy and verve. It’s a rousing and lively set, both of its time (Latin jazz having gotten big in the ’50s thanks to standards like Dizzy Gillespie’s “Manteca”) and unquestionably timeless. Trumpeter Kenny Dorham made an impressive enough debut with 1954’s Kenny Dorham Quintet, but with his take on Afro-Cuban jazz, titled simply Afro-Cuban, he solidified his place in jazz’s hall of fame.
Words by Jeff Terich (JT), Adam Blyweiss (AB), and A.T.
So take a trip back through jazz history with us as we drop the needle on our 25 favorites. If you need to find 75 of the greatest Blue Note records, it’s not that hard to find ’em.
We could have made it a much longer list, of course. On its 75th anniversary - for which the label has launched a new vinyl reissue initiative (!) - Treble is honoring the legendary label by selecting a list of 25 Blue Note essential albums.
It relaunched in 1985 with both legacy acts and new performers on its roster, and since, it’s expanded to include soul, hip-hop, pop and electronic acts alongside its roster of jazz performers. In the ’70s it still held its own, but went dormant in 1979 after some label restructuring occurred under the EMI umbrella. (And let’s give a hand to the incredible album art by Reid Miles.) It went through numerous phases, first releasing 78 RPM records, then expanding into cohesive full-lengths during the jazz Renaissance in the 1950s and ’60s. But there’s one label that’s essentially synonymous with jazz: Blue Note.įounded in 1939 by Alfred Lion and Max Margulis, Blue Note began as an imprint that specialized in pressing swing and boogie woogie records, and later began to build a reputation for releasing bold new sounds in jazz from hard bop to post-bop, and avant-garde and free jazz. In the great discussion of the history of jazz, a handful of notable record labels will inevitably come up - Verve, Impulse, Atlantic, Columbia, and to a lesser extent, CTI and Riverside.
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