Help Me Expand My Music Taste


Hello Everyone,
I know essentially nothing about jazz and blues, but I would like to learn to appreciate these styles of music. To this end, if you would list for me your five favorite jazz or blues albums it would be very helpful in giving me some starting points. My impression is that jazz for example is somewhat of an acquired taste, and that as with wine, some albums are more likely to appeal to a novice than would other albums even by the same musician. I do not have an analogue setup, so my listening is limited to CD's. Let me thank you in advance for your suggestions.
All the best,
Dennis
dgclark0007
Sorry I don't have 5 favorites here's a start!
Luther Allison- Live In Montreux
Buddy Guy- Stone Crazy, Blues Singer, Live The Real Deal
Bloomfield, Cooper, Stills- Super Session
Gary Moore- Blues For Greeny
Ronnie Earl- Blues Virtuoso Live In Europe, Ronnie Earl And Friends
Eric Clapton-From The Cradle, Blues
Robben Ford-Discovering The Blues
Albert King- I'll Play The Blues For You, Born Under A Bad Sign, In Session with SRV
Freddie King- Everything it's all great!
Jimi Hendrix- Blues
Fleetwood Mac- Blues Jam In Chicago,Peter Greens Fleetwood Mac
Howlin Wolf & Clapton- The London Howlin Wolf Sessions
Mike Bloomfield- Live At The Old Waldorf
Koko Taylor- Earth Shaker
T-Bone Walker- Stormy Monday
ZZ Top- One Foot In The Blues
Allman Brothers- The Fillmore Concerts
Roy Buchanan- Sweet Dreams The Anthology
Albert Collins- Truckin
The Paul Butterfield Blues Band S/T
A Tribute To SRV
Must have Box Sets- Muddy Watters Chess, Robert Johnson- The Complete Recordings, Howlin Wolf- Chess, Eric Clapton- Live In The 70's, Elmore James-King Of The Slide Guitar, BB King- King Of The Blues, SRV And Double Trouble
I could go on and on all these artists have many great CD's!
Hello Dennis,

Try to locate a "Borders" or "Barnes & Noble" equipt with auditioning headphones in their CD section. Take these recommended artist list, and head out for several hours of sampling. As "Photon46" mentioned, help us narrow down prefered instruments and music style(s). To many, composition is priority, but as with all music, recording quality varies tremendlessly. A well-engineered/recorded alblum sure increases your HiFi playback experience, and of which, I feel, contributes to much premature component criticism if lacking. Do you have SACD or HDCD?

Frank
Here's an idea that I would only suggest on an audiophile site: Buy a program like Limewire ($50 or so) that allows you to download music for free over the net. It's a peer to peer file sharing program. You can listen to tons of music (start with suggestions you get here) and decide what you like. Many people will balk at this idea and call it 'stealing' music but i disagree: The sound quality is so poor (for an audiophile) that it's not tolerable so you're only using the service to make decisions on what to buy. Exploring music this way, in the last 3 months, I've spent more money on cds than i have in the last couple of years. I love it!
Weather Report's Heavy Weather, self titled Weather Report or Mysterious Traveller are all great

Dave Brubeck, Take Five or Bravo Brubeck are superb

Chick Corea The Leprican
It won't be hard to figure out I'm a fan of GRP Recordings.
Dave Grusin has put out some superbly recorded albums.
One would never know some were recorded live...

"Homage to the Duke" (Dave Grusin)
"The Gershwin Connection" (Dave Grusin)
"The Hang" (Don Grusin)
"Belly of the Sun" (Cassandra Wilson)
"The Essential Dave Brubeck" (2 CD "best" of)

IMHO "The Gershwin Connection" is a must have.
As a matter of fact four of the five I consider as must haves.