Jazz

Where to start: 8 jazz albums, in order

Click a cover to hear 30-second previews. Start at the top; each record takes you a little further.

1. 01

   Kind of Blue

   Miles Davis · 1959

   Often called the best-selling jazz album ever, and one of the calmest: slow tunes built on a few scales, with John Coltrane, Cannonball Adderley and Bill Evans taking turns. Play it start to finish.

   Modal jazz
2. 02

   Time Out

   The Dave Brubeck Quartet · 1959

   'Take Five' is in 5/4 time, yet nothing here feels difficult: light piano, Paul Desmond's dry alto sax and tunes you can hum.

   Cool jazz
3. 03

   Getz/Gilberto

   Stan Getz & João Gilberto · 1964

   Stan Getz's tenor sax meets Brazilian bossa nova. 'The Girl from Ipanema' made it a hit, and the whole album is soft enough for a Sunday morning.

   Bossa nova
4. 04

   The Atomic Mr. Basie

   Count Basie and His Orchestra · 1958

   Jazz as dance-band music: a big band that swings hard and stays tight, playing Neal Hefti's arrangements. This is what swing feels like.

   Swing music
5. 05

   Saxophone Colossus

   Sonny Rollins · 1957

   Saxophone, piano, bass and drums. Rollins plays a calypso ('St. Thomas') and builds long solos out of short melodies: small-group jazz at its most direct.

   Hard bop
6. 06

   Jazz at Massey Hall

   The Quintet · 1953

   Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Bud Powell, Charles Mingus and Max Roach on one stage in Toronto. Fast, dense bebop, recorded live.

   Bebop
7. 07

   Head Hunters

   Herbie Hancock · 1973

   Funk grooves, synthesizers and electric bass. If you know jazz through hip-hop samples, this is your door; 'Chameleon' opens it.

   Jazz fusion
8. 08

   A Love Supreme

   John Coltrane · 1965

   A four-part suite Coltrane wrote as a prayer: intense and searching. Once this one makes sense to you, most of jazz is open.

   Modal jazz

Previews courtesy of Apple Music.

Which one did you like best? Its tag below the cover is the branch to dig into next.

How jazz grew

5 periods, each with the branches that appeared in it. Branches with a dot have their own page.

1. 1910s–1930s

   New Orleans and the swing era

   Jazz left New Orleans with the Great Migration and settled in Chicago and New York. Small 'hot' bands gave way to big bands, and by the mid-1930s swing was America's dance music, led by Duke Ellington, Count Basie and Benny Goodman.

   Dixieland jazzBig bandStrideSwing musicKansas City jazzGypsy jazz

   On the route: record 4

2. 1940s

   Bebop: music for listening

   In New York's after-hours clubs, Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie and Thelonious Monk sped up the tempos and stretched the harmony. Jazz left the dance floor and became music you sit down to hear.

   BebopLatin jazzAfro-Cuban jazz

   On the route: record 6

3. 1950s

   Cool, hard and modal

   The music split several ways. Cool jazz softened the tone; hard bop brought back blues and gospel feeling; and with Kind of Blue in 1959, Miles Davis built tunes on scales instead of fast chord changes. In Rio, bossa nova was taking shape.

   Cool jazzWest Coast jazzHard bopSoul jazzModal jazzThird streamBossa nova

   On the route: record 1, record 2, record 3, record 5, record 8

4. 1960s–1970s

   Free and electric

   Ornette Coleman and John Coltrane pushed past fixed chords and steady time. A few years later Miles Davis plugged in, and fusion mixed jazz with rock and funk.

   Free jazzAvant-garde jazzPost-bopJazz fusionJazz-funk

   On the route: record 7

5. 1980s onward

   Looking back, mixing in

   Neo-bop players went back to acoustic, swinging jazz; smooth jazz found the radio; and DJs and producers folded jazz into acid jazz and hip-hop.

   Neo-bopSmooth jazzAcid jazzNu jazz

Pick a branch of jazz

The 8 branches people play most. Each has its own 8 albums and lineage.

1. 1930sSwing musicBig bands, a strong dance beat, riffs passed between the horns.8 albums · open →
2. 1940sBebopFast tempos, twisting melodies, solos packed with notes.8 albums · open →
3. 1940sCool jazzA softer tone, relaxed tempos, careful arrangements.8 albums · open →
4. 1950sHard bopBebop with more blues and gospel in it: punchy and soulful.8 albums · open →
5. 1950sModal jazzLong, open grooves built on scales; spacious and hypnotic.8 albums · open →
6. 1960sFree jazzNo fixed chords or steady beat: raw, collective improvisation.8 albums · open →
7. 1960sJazz fusionElectric keyboards and bass, rock and funk rhythms.8 albums · open →
8. 1950sBossa novaA quiet Brazilian samba beat, soft vocals, gentle guitar.8 albums · open →

Go deeper

What we have written about jazz, newest first.

1. ▶ Includes video2026-11-01How Bebop Was Born When No One Was RecordingIn 1942 American musicians stopped recording, and modern jazz took shape in the silence. What the war, a tax and the three-minute record did to bebop, with the full documentary, tracks to hear and nine records to explore.
2. ▶ Includes video2026-10-21Where Does the Sense of Class in Jazz Come From?A hundred years ago, jazz was considered sinful; today, it has become synonymous with class. This article draws on sociology and jazz history research to examine who attached this label and to explain why the joy of listening matters more than labels.
3. 2026-09-21Nujabes: The Hidden Samurai Champloo! A Glimpse of Jazz Rap!In 1995, 21-year-old Jun Seba opened a record store in Udagawacho, Shibuya. By day he flipped through records; by night he made beats. He rarely appeared in public throughout his life, yet he looped two bars from old records into lo-fi beats that spread across the world. From his store and his collaborators to Samurai Champloo, plus nine recommended albums for further listening.