Hard bop
Hard bop is a subgenre of jazz that is an extension of bebop (or "bop") music. Journalists and record companies began using the term in the mid-1950s to describe a new current within jazz that incorporated influences from rhythm and blues, gospe ...
is a subgenre of
jazz
Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a m ...
that is an extension of
bebop
Bebop or bop is a style of jazz developed in the early-to-mid-1940s in the United States. The style features compositions characterized by a fast tempo, complex chord progressions with rapid chord changes and numerous changes of key, instrumen ...
(or "bop") music. Journalists and record companies began using the term in the mid-1950s to describe a new current within jazz which incorporated influences from
rhythm and blues
Rhythm and blues, frequently abbreviated as R&B or R'n'B, is a genre of popular music that originated in African-American communities in the 1940s. The term was originally used by record companies to describe recordings marketed predominantly ...
saxophone
The saxophone (often referred to colloquially as the sax) is a type of Single-reed instrument, single-reed woodwind instrument with a conical body, usually made of brass. As with all single-reed instruments, sound is produced when a reed (mouthpi ...
and
piano
The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keybo ...
playing. David H. Rosenthal contends in his book ''Hard Bop'' that the genre is, to a large degree, the natural creation of a generation of
African-American
African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ensl ...
musicians who grew up at a time when bop and
rhythm and blues
Rhythm and blues, frequently abbreviated as R&B or R'n'B, is a genre of popular music that originated in African-American communities in the 1940s. The term was originally used by record companies to describe recordings marketed predominantly ...
were the dominant forms of black American music. Prominent hard bop musicians included
Horace Silver
Horace Ward Martin Tavares Silver (September 2, 1928 – June 18, 2014) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and arranger, particularly in the hard bop style that he helped pioneer in the 1950s.
After playing tenor saxophone and piano at sc ...
Miles Davis
Miles Dewey Davis III (May 26, 1926September 28, 1991) was an American trumpeter, bandleader, and composer. He is among the most influential and acclaimed figures in the history of jazz and 20th-century music. Davis adopted a variety of musi ...
and
Tadd Dameron
Tadley Ewing Peake Dameron (February 21, 1917 – March 8, 1965) was an American jazz composer, arranger, and pianist.
Biography
Born in Cleveland, Ohio, Dameron was the most influential arranger of the bebop era, but also wrote charts for swin ...
. Hard bop is sometimes referred to as "funky hard bop." The "funky" label refers to the rollicking, rhythmic feeling associated with the style. The descriptor is also used to describe
soul jazz
Soul jazz or funky jazz is a subgenre of jazz that incorporates strong influences from hard bop, blues, soul, gospel and rhythm and blues. Soul jazz is often characterized by organ trios featuring the Hammond organ and small combos including ten ...
, which is commonly associated with hard bop.
A
*
Pepper Adams
Park Frederick "Pepper" Adams III (October 8, 1930 – September 10, 1986) was an American jazz baritone saxophonist and composer. He composed 42 pieces, was the leader on eighteen albums spanning 28 years, and participated in 600 sessions as a s ...
Sinan Alimanović
Sinan Alimanović (born 11 February 1954) is a Bosnian jazz pianist, organist, composer, conductor, arranger and educator.
Biography
Sinan Alimanović has worked with American and European jazz musicians such as Randy Brecker, Harvie S, Duško ...
Curtis Amy
Curtis Amy (October 11, 1929 – June 5, 2002) was an American jazz saxophonist.
Biography
Amy was born in Houston, Texas, United States. He learned how to play clarinet before joining the Army, and during his time in service, picked up the teno ...
- saxophone
*
Gilad Atzmon
Gilad Atzmon ( he, גלעד עצמון, ; born 9 June 1963) is a British jazz saxophonist, novelist, political activist, and writer.
As a musician, he is best known as a saxophonist and bandleader. His instruments include the saxophone, acco ...
- saxophone
B
*
Benny Bailey
Ernest Harold "Benny" Bailey (August 13, 1925 – April 14, 2005) was an American jazz trumpeter.
Biography
A native of Cleveland, Ohio, Bailey briefly studied flute and piano before turning to trumpet. He attended the Cleveland Conserva ...
- trumpet
*
Gabe Baltazar
Gabriel Ruiz Hiroshi Baltazar Jr. (November 1, 1929 – June 12, 2022) was an American jazz alto saxophonist and woodwind doubler.
Background and early years
His mother, born Chiyoko Haraga on a Hawaii sugarcane plantation, was the daughter of ...
Gary Bartz
Gary Bartz (born September 26, 1940) is an American jazz saxophonist. He has won two Grammy Awards.
Biography
Bartz studied at the Juilliard School. In the early 1960s, he performed with Eric Dolphy and McCoy Tyner in Charles Mingus' Jazz Wor ...
Walter Bishop, Jr.
Walter Bishop Jr. (October 4, 1927 – January 24, 1998) was an American jazz pianist.
Early life
Bishop was born in New York City on October 4, 1927.Greene, Philip; Kernfeld, Barr"Bishop, Walter Jr." ''The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz'' (2nd ed ...
Terence Blanchard
Terence Oliver Blanchard (born March 13, 1962) is an American trumpeter and composer. He started his career in 1982 as a member of the Lionel Hampton Orchestra, then The Jazz Messengers. He has composed more than forty film scores and performed ...
- trumpet
*
Walter Booker
Walter Booker (December 17, 1933 – November 24, 2006) was an American jazz musician. A native of Prairie View, Texas, Booker was a reliable bass player and an underrated stylist. His playing was marked by voice-like inflections, glissandos and ...
- bass
*
Michael Brecker
Michael Leonard Brecker (March 29, 1949 – January 13, 2007) was an American jazz saxophonist and composer. He was awarded 15 Grammy Awards as both performer and composer. He was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from Berklee College of M ...
- tenor saxophone
*
Cecil Brooks III
Cecil Brooks III (born 1959) is an American jazz drummer and record producer who has worked with Arthur Blythe, Russell Gunn, John Hicks, Andrew Hill, Etta Jones, Roseanna Vitro, Marvin Peterson, and Jimmy Ponder.
A native of the Homewood n ...
- drums
*
Tina Brooks
Harold Floyd "Tina" Brooks (June 7, 1932 – August 13, 1974) was an American jazz tenor saxophonist and composer best remembered for his work in the hard bop style.
Early years
Harold Floyd Brooks was born in Fayetteville, North Carolina, an ...
- saxophone
*
Bobby Broom
Robert Broom Jr. (born January 18, 1961) is an American jazz guitarist, composer, and educator. He was born and raised in New York City, then moved to Chicago, which has been his home town since 1984. He performs and records with The Bobby Broo ...
Kenny Burrell
Kenneth Earl Burrell (born July 31, 1931) is an American jazz guitarist known for his work on numerous top jazz labels: Prestige, Blue Note, Verve, CTI, Muse, and Concord. His collaborations with Jimmy Smith were notable, and produced the 1965 ...
Conte Candoli
Secondo "Conte" Candoli (July 12, 1927 – December 14, 2001) was an American jazz trumpeter based on the West Coast. He played in the big bands of Woody Herman, Stan Kenton, Benny Goodman, and Dizzy Gillespie, and in Doc Severinsen's NBC Orc ...
Paul Chambers
Paul Laurence Dunbar Chambers Jr. (April 22, 1935 – January 4, 1969) was an American jazz double bassist. A fixture of rhythm sections during the 1950s and 1960s, he has become one of the most widely-known jazz bassists of the hard bop era. ...
- double-bass
*
Pete Christlieb
Pete Christlieb (born February 16, 1945) is an American jazz bebop, West Coast jazz and hard bop tenor saxophonist.
Biography
Christlieb was born in Los Angeles, California, United States, and is the son of bassoonist Don Christlieb. Christlieb ...
- saxophone
*
Sonny Clark
Conrad Yeatis "Sonny" Clark (July 21, 1931 – January 13, 1963) was an American jazz pianist and composer who mainly worked in the hard bop idiom.
Early life
Clark was born and raised in Herminie, Pennsylvania, a coal mining town east of Pi ...
- piano
*
Thomas Clausen Thomas Clausen may refer to:
* Thomas Clausen (educator) (1939–2002), educator from Baton Rouge, Louisiana
*Thomas Clausen (musician) (born 1949), Danish jazz pianist
*Thomas Clausen (mathematician)
Thomas Clausen (16 January 1801, Snogbæk, ...
Jimmy Cleveland
James Milton Cleveland (May 3, 1926 – August 23, 2008) was an American jazz trombonist born in Wartrace, Tennessee.
- trombone
*
Jimmy Cobb
Wilbur James "Jimmy" Cobb (January 20, 1929May 24, 2020) was an American jazz drummer. He was part of Miles Davis's First Great Sextet. At the time of his death, he had been the band's last surviving member for nearly thirty years. He was a ...
- drums
*
Tony Coe
Anthony George Coe (born 29 November 1934) is an English jazz musician who plays clarinet, bass clarinet, flute as well as soprano, alto, and tenor saxophones.
Career
Born in Canterbury, Kent, England, Coe started out on clarinet and was self- ...
- saxophone, clarinet
*
George Coleman
George Edward Coleman (born March 8, 1935) is an American jazz saxophonist known for his work with Miles Davis and Herbie Hancock in the 1960s. In 2015, he was named an NEA Jazz Master.
Early life
Coleman was born in Memphis, Tennessee. He was ...
- saxophone
*
Johnny Coles
John Coles (July 3, 1926 – December 21, 1997) was an American jazz trumpeter.
Early life
Coles was born in Trenton, New Jersey on July 3, 1926. He grew up in Philadelphia and was self-taught on trumpet.
Later life and career
Coles spent his ...
- trumpet
*
John Coltrane
John William Coltrane (September 23, 1926 – July 17, 1967) was an American jazz saxophonist, bandleader and composer. He is among the most influential and acclaimed figures in the history of jazz and 20th-century music.
Born and raise ...
- tenor and soprano saxophone
*
Robert Conti
Robert Conti (born November 21, 1945) is an American jazz guitarist and educator.
Conti was born in Philadelphia and was an autodidact, first performing locally at age fourteen and mentoring with Pat Martino. In 1966, after four years on the ro ...
Sonny Criss
William "Sonny" Criss (23 October 1927 – 19 November 1977) was an American jazz musician.
An alto saxophonist of prominence during the bebop era of jazz, he was one of many players influenced by Charlie Parker.
Biography
William Criss wa ...
- saxophone
*
Tony Crombie
Anthony John Kronenberg (27 August 1925 – 18 October 1999), known professionally as Tony Crombie, was an English jazz drummer, pianist, bandleader, and composer. He was regarded as one of the finest English jazz drummers and bandleaders, an oc ...
Ronnie Cuber
Ronald Edward Cuber (December 25, 1941 – October 7, 2022) was an American jazz saxophonist. He also played in Latin, pop, rock, and blues sessions. In addition to his primary instrument, baritone sax, he played tenor sax, soprano sax, clarinet ...
-saxophone
*
Ted Curson
Theodore Curson (June 3, 1935 – November 4, 2012) was an American jazz trumpeter.
Life and career
Curson was born in Philadelphia. He became interested in playing trumpet after watching a newspaper salesman play a silver trumpet. Curson's fath ...
- trumpet
*
Junior Cook
Herman "Junior" Cook (July 22, 1934 – February 3, 1992) was an American hard bop tenor saxophone player.
Biography
Cook was born in Pensacola, Florida. After playing with Dizzy Gillespie in 1958, Cook was a member of the Horace Silver Quin ...
Eddie Daniels
Eddie Daniels (born October 19, 1941) is an American musician and composer. Although he is best known as a jazz clarinetist, he has also played saxophone and flute as well as classical music on clarinet.
Early life, family and education
Daniel ...
- sax, clarinet
*
Art Davis
Arthur David Davis (December 6, 1934 – July 29, 2007) was a double-bassist, known for his work with Thelonious Monk, John Coltrane, Dizzy Gillespie, McCoy Tyner and Max Roach.
Biography
Davis was born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, United Stat ...
- double-bass
*
Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis
Edward F. Davis (March 2, 1922 – November 3, 1986), known professionally as Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis, was an American jazz tenor saxophonist.
It is unclear how he acquired the moniker "Lockjaw" (later shortened in "Jaws"): it is either said that ...
Miles Davis
Miles Dewey Davis III (May 26, 1926September 28, 1991) was an American trumpeter, bandleader, and composer. He is among the most influential and acclaimed figures in the history of jazz and 20th-century music. Davis adopted a variety of musi ...
Steve Davis
Steve Davis (born 22 August 1957) is an English retired professional snooker player who is currently a commentator, musician, DJ, and author. He is best known for dominating professional snooker during the 1980s, when he reached eight World S ...
- trombone
*
Walter Davis, Jr.
Walter Davis Jr. (September 2, 1932 – June 2, 1990) was an American bebop and hard bop pianist.
Davis once left the music world to be a tailor, but returned. A soloist, bandleader, and accompanist, he amassed a body of work while never be ...
- piano
*
Alan Dawson
Alan Dawson (July 14, 1929 – February 23, 1996) was an American jazz drummer and percussion teacher based in Boston.
Biography
Dawson was born in Marietta, Pennsylvania and raised in Roxbury, Massachusetts. Serving in the U.S. Army during th ...
- drums
*
Barbara Dennerlein
Barbara Dennerlein (born 25 September 1964 in Munich) is a German jazz organist. She has achieved particular critical acclaim for using the bass pedalboard on a Hammond organ and for integrating synthesizer sounds onto the instrument, and was de ...
- organ
*
Jimmy Deuchar
James Deuchar (26 June 1930 – 9 September 1993) was a Scottish jazz trumpeter and big band arranger, born in Dundee, Scotland. He found fame as a performer and arranger in the 1950s and 1960s. Deuchar was taught trumpet by John Lynch, who lear ...
Niels Lan Doky
Niels Lan Doky (born 3 October 1963) is a Danish jazz pianist, composer and producer. He is the older brother of jazz bassist Chris Minh Doky.
Biography
He was born in Copenhagen of a Danish mother and Vietnamese father. His father worked as a ...
- piano
*
Lou Donaldson
Lou Donaldson (born November 1, 1926) is an American retired jazz Alto saxophone, alto saxophonist. He is best known for his soulful, bluesy approach to playing the alto saxophone, although in his formative years he was, as many were of the bebop ...
Ray Draper
Raymond Allen Draper (August 3, 1940, New York City – November 1, 1982) was an American jazz tuba player.
Early life and education
Draper was born in New York City and attended the Manhattan School of Music in the mid-1950s.
Career
As a ...
- tuba
*
Kenny Drew
Kenneth Sidney "Kenny" Drew (August 28, 1928 – August 4, 1993) was an American-Danish jazz pianist.
Biography
Drew was born in New York City, United States, and received piano lessons from the age of five.Feather, Leonard, & Ira Gitler ( ...
- piano
*
Ted Dunbar
Earl Theodore Dunbar (January 17, 1937 – May 29, 1998) was an American jazz guitarist, composer, and educator.
Career
Born in Port Arthur, Texas, Dunbar trained as a pharmacist at Texas Southern University, but by the 1970s he only did pharma ...
Teddy Edwards
Theodore Marcus Edwards (April 26, 1924 – April 20, 2003) was an American jazz tenor saxophonist.
Biography
Edwards was born in Jackson, Mississippi, United States. He learned to play at a very early age, first on alto saxophone and the ...
Joe Farrell
Joseph Carl Firrantello (December 16, 1937 – January 10, 1986), known as Joe Farrell, was an American jazz multi-instrumentalist who primarily performed as a saxophonist and flutist. He is best known for a series of albums under his own name o ...
- flute, sax
*
Victor Feldman
Victor Stanley Feldman (7 April 1934 – 12 May 1987) was an English jazz musician who played mainly piano, vibraphone, and percussion. He began performing professionally during childhood, eventually earning acclaim in the UK jazz scene as ...
- piano, vibes
*
Tommy Flanagan
Thomas Lee Flanagan (March 16, 1930 – November 16, 2001) was an American jazz pianist and composer. He grew up in Detroit, initially influenced by such pianists as Art Tatum, Teddy Wilson, and Nat King Cole, and then by bebop musicians. ...
- piano
*
Ricky Ford
Ricky Ford (born March 4, 1954) is an American jazz tenor saxophonist.
Biography
Ford was born in Boston, Massachusetts, United States,) and studied at the New England Conservatory. Ricky Ford AllMusic In 1974, he recorded with Gunther Schulle ...
Von Freeman
Earle Lavon "Von" Freeman Sr. (October 3, 1923 – August 11, 2012) was an American hard bop jazz tenor saxophonist.
Biography
Born in Chicago, Illinois, Freeman as a young child was exposed to jazz. His father, George, a city policeman, was a ...
- sax
*
Curtis Fuller
Curtis DuBois Fuller (December 15, 1932May 8, 2021) was an American jazz trombonist. He was a member of Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers and contributed to many classic jazz recordings.
Early life
Fuller was born in Detroit on December 15, 1932. ...
- trombone
G
*
Red Garland
William McKinley "Red" Garland Jr. (May 13, 1923 – April 23, 1984) was an American modern jazz pianist. Known for his work as a bandleader and during the 1950s with Miles Davis, Garland helped popularize the block chord style of playing in jazz ...
Dexter Gordon
Dexter Gordon (February 27, 1923 – April 25, 1990) was an American jazz tenor saxophonist, composer, bandleader, and actor. He was among the most influential early bebop musicians, which included other greats such as Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gi ...
- tenor saxophone
*
Benny Green (pianist)
Benny Green (born April 4, 1963) is an American hard bop jazz pianist who was a member of Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers. He has been compared to Bud Powell and Oscar Peterson in style and counts them as influences.
Biography
Green was born in ...
- piano
*
Grant Green
Grant Green (June 6, 1935 – January 31, 1979) was an American jazz guitarist and composer.
Recording prolifically for Blue Note Records as both leader and sideman, Green performed in the hard bop, soul jazz, bebop, and Latin-tinged idioms ...
- guitar
*
Johnny Griffin
John Arnold Griffin III (April 24, 1928 – July 25, 2008) was an American jazz tenor saxophonist. Nicknamed "the Little Giant" for his short stature and forceful playing, Griffin's career began in the mid-1940s and continued until the month of ...
- tenor saxophone
*
Gigi Gryce
Gigi Gryce (born George General Grice Jr.; November 28, 1925 – March 14, 1983), later Basheer Qusim, was an American jazz saxophonist, flautist, clarinetist, composer, arranger, and educator.
While his performing career was relatively short, ...
- saxophone
*Randy Gelispie - drums
H
*
Charlie Haden
Charles Edward Haden (August 6, 1937 – July 11, 2014) was an American jazz double bass player, bandleader, composer and educator whose career spanned more than 50 years. In the late 1950s, he was an original member of the ground-breaking ...
- double-bass
*
Tim Hagans
Tim Hagans (born August 19, 1954) is an American jazz trumpeter, arranger, and composer. He has been nominated for three Grammy Awards: Best Instrumental Composition for "Box of Cannoli" on ''The Avatar Sessions'' (Fuzzy Music, 2010); Best Contem ...
Roland Hanna
Roland Pembroke Hanna (February 10, 1932 – November 13, 2002) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and teacher.
Biography
Hanna studied classical piano from the age of 11, but was strongly interested in jazz, having been introduced to i ...
- piano
*
Wilbur Harden
Wilbur Harden (December 31, 1924 in Birmingham, Alabama – June 10, 1969 in New York City) was an American jazz trumpeter, flugelhornist, and composer.
Harden is best remembered for his recordings with saxophonists Yusef Lateef and John Coltrane ...
- trumpet
*
Bill Hardman
William Franklin Hardman Jr. (April 6, 1933 – December 6, 1990) was an American jazz trumpeter and flugelhornist who chiefly played hard bop. He was married to Roseline and they had a daughter Nadege.
Career
Hardman was born and grew ...
Barry Harris
Barry Doyle Harris (December 15, 1929 – December 8, 2021) was an American jazz pianist, bandleader, composer, arranger, and educator. He was an exponent of the bebop style.
Life and career
Harris was born in Detroit, Michigan, on December ...
Hampton Hawes
Hampton Barnett Hawes Jr. (November 13, 1928 – May 22, 1977) was an American jazz pianist. He was the author of the memoir ''Raise Up Off Me'', which won the Deems-Taylor Award for music writing in 1975.
Early life
Hampton Hawes was born on ...
- piano
*
Louis Hayes
Louis Hayes (born May 31, 1937) is an American jazz drummer and band leader. He was with McCoy Tyner's trio for more than three years. Since 1989 he has led his own band, and together with Vincent Herring formed the Cannonball Legacy Band. He ...
- drums
*
Roy Haynes
Roy Owen Haynes (born March 13, 1925) is an American jazz drummer. He is among the most recorded drummers in jazz. In a career lasting over 80 years, he has played swing, bebop, jazz fusion, avant-garde jazz and is considered a pioneer of jaz ...
- drums
*
Jimmy Heath
James Edward Heath (October 25, 1926 – January 19, 2020), nicknamed Little Bird, was an American jazz saxophonist, composer, arranger, and big band leader. He was the brother of bassist Percy Heath and drummer Albert Heath.
Biography
Heath w ...
- sax
*
Percy Heath
Percy Heath (April 30, 1923 – April 28, 2005) was an American jazz bassist, brother of saxophonist Jimmy Heath and drummer Albert Heath, with whom he formed the Heath Brothers in 1975. Heath played with the Modern Jazz Quartet throughout ...
Vincent Herring
Vincent Dwayne Herring (born November 19, 1964) is an American jazz saxophonist, flautist, composer, and educator. Known for his fiery and soulful playing in the bands of Horace Silver, Freddie Hubbard, and Nat Adderley in the earlier stages of h ...
- sax
*
Billy Higgins
Billy Higgins (October 11, 1936 – May 3, 2001) was an American jazz drummer. He played mainly free jazz and hard bop.
Biography
Higgins was born in Los Angeles, California, United States. Higgins played on Ornette Coleman's first records, ...
Ron Holloway
Ronald Edward Holloway (born August 24, 1953) is an American tenor saxophonist. He is listed in the ''Biographical Encyclopedia of Jazz'' where veteran jazz critic Ira Gitler described Holloway as a "Hard bear-down-hard-bopper who can blow auth ...
Stix Hooper
Stix or STIX may refer to:
People
* Stix Hooper (born 1938), American jazz musician
* Gary Stix, American journalist
* Thomas H. Stix (1924–2001), American physicist
* Christine Stix-Hackl (born 1957), Austrian jurist
Arts and entertainment ...
- drums
*
Elmo Hope
St. Elmo Sylvester Hope (June 27, 1923 – May 19, 1967) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and arranger, chiefly in the bebop and hard bop genres. He grew up playing and listening to jazz and classical music with Bud Powell, and both were ...
- piano
*
Lex Humphries
Lex Humphries (August 22, 1936 – July 11, 1994) was an American jazz drummer. He worked with two musicians known for mixing world music with jazz: Sun Ra and Yusef Lateef. As a member of Sun Ra's "Arkestra" he appeared in the film '' Space Is ...
Eric Ineke
Eric Ineke (born Haarlem, April 1, 1947) is a Dutch jazz drummer who started his career in the 1960s. After a few years of lessons of John Engels, he gained his first experience as jazzdrummer with singer Henny Vonk and tenorsaxophonist Ferdina ...
Clifford Jarvis
Clifford Osbourne Jarvis (August 26, 1941 – November 26, 1999) was an American hard bop and free jazz drummer, who in the 1980s moved to London, England, where he spent the remainder of his career.
Biography
Clifford Jarvis, the son of Malc ...
- drums
*
Bobby Jaspar
Bobby Jaspar (20 February 1926 – 28 February 1963) was a Belgian cool jazz and hard bop saxophonist, flautist and composer.
Early life
Born in Liège, Belgium, Jaspar learned to play piano and clarinet at a young age. Later, he took up ...
LaMont Johnson
Ernest Lamont Johnson Jr. (September 30, 1922 – October 24, 2010) was an American actor and film director who has appeared in and directed many television shows and movies. He won two Emmy Awards.
Early years
Johnson was born in Stockto ...
Carmell Jones
Carmell Jones (July 19, 1936 – November 7, 1996) was an American jazz trumpet player.
Biography
Jones was born in Kansas City, Kansas, United States. He started piano lessons at age five, and trumpet lessons at age seven. His first professional ...
- trumpet
*
Elvin Jones
Elvin Ray Jones (September 9, 1927 – May 18, 2004) was an American jazz drummer of the post-bop era.
Most famously a member of John Coltrane's quartet, with whom he recorded from late 1960 to late 1965, Jones appeared on such widely celebrate ...
Philly Joe Jones
Joseph Rudolph "Philly Joe" Jones (July 15, 1923 – August 30, 1985) was an American jazz drummer.
Biography Early career
As a child, Jones appeared as a featured tap dancer on ''The Kiddie Show'' on the Philadelphia radio station WIP. He wa ...
Thad Jones
Thaddeus Joseph Jones (March 28, 1923 – August 20, 1986) was an American jazz trumpeter, composer, and bandleader who has been called "one of the all-time greatest jazz trumpet soloists".
Biography
Thad Jones was born in Pontiac, Michigan, U ...
- trumpet
*
Clifford Jordan
Clifford Laconia Jordan (September 2, 1931 – March 27, 1993) was an American jazz tenor saxophone player. While in Chicago, he performed with Max Roach, Sonny Stitt, and some rhythm and blues groups. He moved to New York City in 1957, after ...
- sax
*
Duke Jordan
Irving Sidney "Duke" Jordan (April 1, 1922 – August 8, 2006) was an American jazz pianist.
Biography
Jordan was born in New York and raised in Brooklyn where he attended Boys High School. An imaginative and gifted pianist, Jordan was a regul ...
- piano
K
*
Geoff Keezer
Geoffrey Keezer (born November 20, 1970) is an American jazz pianist.
Keezer was playing in jazz clubs as a teenager, playing piano for Art Blakey at age 18 and touring with Joshua Redman, Benny Golson and Ray Brown in his 20s. He has toured w ...
- piano
*
Wynton Kelly
Wynton Charles Kelly (December 2, 1931 – April 12, 1971) was an American jazz pianist and composer. He is known for his lively, blues-based playing and as one of the finest accompanists in jazz. He began playing professionally at the age of ...
- piano
*
Rahsaan Roland Kirk
Rahsaan Roland Kirk (born Ronald Theodore Kirk; August 7, 1935Kernfeld, Barry.Kirk, Roland" ''The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz'', 2nd ed. Ed. Barry Kernfeld. '' Grove Music Online''. '' Oxford Music Online''. Retrieved February 1, 2009-. "The yea ...
- tenor sax, flute
*
Ryan Kisor
Ryan Kisor (born April 12, 1973) is an American jazz trumpeter.
A native of Sioux City, Iowa, Kisor learned trumpet from his father, Larry Kisor, and started playing in a local dance band (the Eddie Skeets Orchestra) at age ten. Kisor began clas ...
Harold Land
Harold de Vance Land (December 18, 1928 – July 27, 2001) was an American hard bop and post-bop tenor saxophonist. Land developed his hard bop playing with the Max Roach/ Clifford Brown band into a personal, modern style, often rivalling Cliffo ...
Pete La Roca
Pete "La Roca" Sims (born Peter Sims; April 7, 1938 – November 20, 2012, known as Pete La Roca from 1957 until 1968) was an American jazz drummer and attorney. Born and raised in Harlem by a pianist mother and a stepfather who played trumpet, ...
- drums
*
Yusef Lateef
Yusef Abdul Lateef (born William Emanuel Huddleston; October 9, 1920 – December 23, 2013) was an American jazz multi-instrumentalist, composer, and prominent figure among the Ahmadiyya Community in America.
Although Lateef's main instruments ...
- sax
*
Doug Lawrence
Douglas Lawrence Osowski, known professionally as Mr. Lawrence, is an American voice actor, writer, animator, storyboard artist, director, and comedian. He is best known for his work as a writer and voice actor for the Nicktoons ''Rocko's Mode ...
- sax
*
Hubert Laws
Hubert Laws (born November 10, 1939) is an American flutist and saxophonist with a career spanning over 40 years in jazz, classical, and other music genres. Laws is one of the few classical artists who has also mastered jazz, pop, and rhythm- ...
Herbie Lewis
Herbie Lewis (February 17, 1941 – May 18, 2007) was an American jazz double bassist. He played or recorded with Cannonball Adderley, Stanley Turrentine, Bobby Hutcherson, Freddie Hubbard, Harold Land, Jackie McLean, Archie Shepp, Tete Mont ...
- double-bass
*
Victor Lewis
Victor Lewis (born May 20, 1950) is an American jazz drummer, composer, and educator.
Early life
Victor Lewis was born on May 20, 1950 in Omaha, Nebraska. His father, Richard Lewis, who played saxophone and mother, Camille, a pianist-vocalist ...
- drums
*
Booker Little
Booker Little Jr. (April 2, 1938 – October 5, 1961) – accessed June 2010 was an American
- trumpet
*
Joe Lovano
Joseph Salvatore Lovano (born December 29, 1952)"Joe Lovano." ''Contemporary Musicians''. Vol. 13. Farmington Hills, MI: Gale, 1994. Retrieved via ''Biography in Context'' database, May 5, 2017. is an American jazz saxophonist, alto clarin ...
- sax
M
*
Harold Mabern
Harold Mabern Jr. (March 20, 1936 – September 17, 2019) was an American jazz pianist and composer, principally in the hard bop, post-bop, and soul jazz fields.Feather, Leonard; Gitler, Ira (2007) ''The Biographical Encyclopedia of Jazz''. p. 4 ...
Hank Marr
Hank Marr (30 January 1927 – 16 March 2004) was a jazz musician known for his work on the Hammond B-3 organ.
Career
Natives of Columbus, Ohio, Hank Marr and tenor saxophonist Rusty Bryant co-led a group that toured for several years, beginning i ...
Pat Martino
Pat Martino (born Patrick Carmen Azzara; August 25, 1944 – November 1, 2021) was an American jazz guitarist and composer.
Biography
Martino was born Patrick Carmen Azzara in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States, to father Carmen "Mickey" ...
Christian McBride
Christian McBride (born May 31, 1972) is an American jazz bassist, composer and arranger. He has appeared on more than 300 recordings as a sideman, and is an eight-time Grammy Award winner.
McBride has performed and recorded with a number of j ...
Howard McGhee
Howard McGhee (March 6, 1918 – July 17, 1987) was one of the first American bebop jazz trumpeters, with Dizzy Gillespie, Fats Navarro and Idrees Sulieman. He was known for his fast fingering and high notes. He had an influence on younger beb ...
- trumpet
*
Gary McFarland
Gary Robert McFarland (October 23, 1933 – November 3, 1971) was an American composer, arranger, vibraphonist and vocalist. He recorded for the jazz imprints Verve and Impulse! Records during the 1960s. '' Down Beat magazine'' said he made "on ...
- vibraphone, vocals
*
Al McKibbon
Al McKibbon (January 1, 1919 – July 29, 2005) was an American jazz double bassist, known for his work in bop, hard bop, and Latin jazz.
In 1947, after working with Lucky Millinder, Tab Smith, J. C. Heard, and Coleman Hawkins, he replaced ...
- double-bass
*
Jackie McLean
John Lenwood "Jackie" McLean (May 17, 1931 – March 31, 2006) was an American jazz alto saxophonist, composer, bandleader, and educator, and is one of the few musicians to be elected to the ''DownBeat'' Hall of Fame in the year of their deat ...
- sax
*
René McLean
René McLean (born December 16, 1946) is a hard bop saxophonist and flutist. He was born in New York City. He started playing guitar before receiving an alto saxophone and instruction from his father, the alto saxophonist Jackie McLean.Allmusic ...
Jymie Merritt
Jymie Merritt (May 3, 1926 – April 10, 2020) was an American jazz double-bassist, electric-bass pioneer, band leader and composer. Merritt was a member of Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers group from 1957 until 1962. The same year he left Blakey's b ...
- double-bass
*
Pierre Michelot
Pierre Michelot (3 March 1928 – 3 July 2005) was a French jazz double bass player and arranger.
Early life
Michelot was born in Saint-Denis, Seine-Saint-Denis, Paris on 3 March 1928. He studied piano from 1936 until 1938. He switched to playin ...
- double-bass
*
Mulgrew Miller
Mulgrew Miller (August 13, 1955 – May 29, 2013) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and educator. As a child he played in churches and was influenced on piano by Ramsey Lewis and then Oscar Peterson. Aspects of their styles remained i ...
Blue Mitchell
Richard Allen "Blue" Mitchell (March 13, 1930 – May 21, 1979) was an American trumpeter and composer who worked in jazz, rhythm and blues, soul, rock and funk. He recorded albums as leader and sideman for Riverside, Mainstream Records, and ...
- trumpet
*
Billy Mitchell
William Lendrum Mitchell (December 29, 1879 – February 19, 1936) was a United States Army officer who is regarded as the father of the United States Air Force.
Mitchell served in France during World War I and, by the conflict's end, command ...
Thelonious Monk
Thelonious Sphere Monk (, October 10, 1917 – February 17, 1982) was an American jazz pianist and composer. He had a unique improvisational style and made numerous contributions to the standard jazz repertoire, including " 'Round Midnight", ...
- piano
*
Buddy Montgomery
Charles "Buddy" Montgomery (January 30, 1930 – May 14, 2009) was an American jazz vibraphonist and pianist. He was the younger brother of Wes and Monk Montgomery, a guitarist and bassist respectively.
Buddy and brother Monk formed The Masters ...
- vibraphone, piano
*
Wes Montgomery
John Leslie "Wes" Montgomery (March 6, 1923 – June 15, 1968) was an American jazz guitarist. Montgomery was known for an unusual technique of plucking the strings with the side of his thumb and his extensive use of octaves, which gave him a dist ...
- guitar
*
Tete Montoliu
Vicenç Montoliu i Massana, better known as Tete Montoliu (28 March 1933 – 24 August 1997) was a Spanish jazz pianist from Catalonia, Spain. Born blind, he learnt braille music at age seven. His styles varied from hard bop, through afro-Cuban, ...
Frank Morgan
Francis Phillip Wuppermann (June 1, 1890 – September 18, 1949), known professionally as Frank Morgan, was an American character actor. He was best known for his appearances in films starting in the silent era in 1916, and then numerous sound ...
- sax
*
Lee Morgan
Edward Lee Morgan (July 10, 1938 – February 19, 1972) was an American jazz trumpeter and composer.
One of the key hard bop musicians of the 1960s, Morgan came to prominence in his late teens, recording on John Coltrane's '' Blue Train'' (1 ...
- trumpet
*
Dick Morrissey
Richard Edwin Morrissey (9 May 1940 – 8 November 2000) was a British jazz musician and composer. He played the tenor saxophone, soprano saxophone and flute.
Biography Background
He was born in Horley, Surrey, England. Dick Morrissey emerg ...
- sax, flute
*
Ronald Muldrow
Ronald Muldrow (February 2, 1949 in Chicago – January 31, 2007 in Los Angeles) was a soul jazz and hard bop jazz guitarist.
As an emerging jazz guitarist in the early 1970s, Muldrow connected with soul-jazz saxophonist Eddie Harris and contrib ...
- guitar
N
*
Lewis Nash
Lewis Nash (born December 30, 1958) is an American jazz drummer. According to ''Modern Drummer'' magazineNashhas one of the longest discographies in jazz and has played on over 400 records, earning him the honor of Jazz's Most Valuable Player ...
- drums
*
Oliver Nelson
Oliver Edward Nelson (June 4, 1932 – October 28, 1975) was an American jazz saxophonist, clarinetist, arranger, composer, and bandleader. His 1961 Impulse! album ''The Blues and the Abstract Truth'' (1961) is regarded as one of the most signifi ...
- sax
*
Phineas Newborn, Jr.
Phineas Newborn Jr. (December 14, 1931 – May 26, 1989) was an American jazz pianist, whose principal influences were Art Tatum, Oscar Peterson, and Bud Powell.
Biography
Newborn was born in Whiteville, Tennessee, and came from a musical famil ...
Cecil Payne
Cecil Payne (December 14, 1922 – November 27, 2007) was an American jazz baritone saxophonist born in Brooklyn, New York. Payne also played the alto saxophone and flute. He played with other prominent jazz musicians, in particular Dizzy Gilles ...
Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen
Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen (, 27 May 1946 – 19 April 2005), also known by his abbreviated nickname NHØP, was a Danish jazz double bassist.
Biography
Pedersen was born in Osted, near Roskilde, on the Danish island of Zealand, the son of ...
Houston Person
Houston Person (born November 10, 1934) is an American jazz tenor saxophonist and record producer. Although he has performed in the hard bop and swing genres, he is most experienced in and best known for his work in soul jazz. He received the ...
Richie Powell
Richard Powell (September 5, 1931 – June 26, 1956) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and arranger. He was not assisted in his musical development by Bud, his older and better known brother, but both played predominantly in the bebop style. ...
Ike Quebec
Ike Abrams Quebec (August 17, 1918 – January 16, 1963) was an American jazz tenor saxophonist. He began his career in the big band era of the 1940s, then fell from prominence for a time until launching a comeback in the years before his dea ...
- sax
R
*
Jimmy Raney
James Elbert Raney (August 20, 1927 – May 10, 1995) was an American jazz guitarist, born in Louisville, Kentucky, United States, known for his work from 1951 to 1952 and then from 1953 to 1954 with the Red Norvo trio (replacing Tal Farlow) and ...
- guitar
*
Sonny Red
Sylvester Kyner Jr. (December 17, 1932 – March 20, 1981), known as Sonny Red, was an American jazz alto saxophonist and composer associated with the hard bop idiom among other styles.
Sonny Red played with Art Blakey, Curtis Fuller, Paul Qu ...
- alto sax
*
Freddie Redd
Freddie Redd (May 29, 1928 – March 17, 2021) was an American hard-bop pianist and composer. He is best known for writing music to accompany '' The Connection'' (1959), a play by Jack Gelber. According to Peter Watrous, writing in ''The New Y ...
Emily Remler
Emily Remler (September 18, 1957 – May 4, 1990) was an American jazz guitarist, active from the late 1970s until her death in 1990.
Early life and influences
Born in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey,Staff"Emily Remler Dies On Australia Tour; Gui ...
- guitar
*
Melvin Rhyne
Melvin Rhyne (October 12, 1936 – March 5, 2013), was a jazz organist best known for his work with Wes Montgomery.
Biography
Melvin Rhyne was born in Indianapolis in 1936 and started playing the piano shortly after. At 19 years old, Rhyne s ...
- organ
*
Jerome Richardson
Jerome Richardson (November 15, 1920 – June 23, 2000) was an American jazz musician, tenor saxophonist, and flute player, who also played soprano sax, alto sax, baritone sax, clarinet, bass clarinet, alto flute and piccolo. He played with C ...
- sax
*
Larry Ridley
Larry Ridley (born September 3, 1937) is an American jazz bassist and music educator. Allmusic Biography/ref>
Biography
Ridley was born and reared in Indianapolis, Indiana. He began performing professionally while still in high school in the 1950s ...
Max Roach
Maxwell Lemuel Roach (January 10, 1924 – August 16, 2007) was an American jazz drummer and composer. A pioneer of bebop, he worked in many other styles of music, and is generally considered one of the most important drummers in history. He work ...
- drums
*
Marcus Roberts
Marthaniel "Marcus" Roberts (born August 7, 1963) is an American jazz pianist, composer, arranger, bandleader, and teacher.
Early life
Roberts was born in Jacksonville, Florida, United States. His mother was a gospel singer who had gone blind a ...
- piano
*
Red Rodney
Robert Roland Chudnick (September 27, 1927 – May 27, 1994), known professionally as Red Rodney, was an American jazz trumpeter.
Biography
Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, he became a professional musician at 15, working in the mid-1940 ...
Wallace Roney
Wallace Roney (May 25, 1960 – March 31, 2020) was an American jazz ( hard bop and post-bop) trumpeter. He has won 1 Grammy award and has two nominations.
Roney took lessons from Clark Terry and Dizzy Gillespie and studied with Miles Davis fr ...
Charlie Rouse
Charlie Rouse (April 6, 1924 – November 30, 1988) was an American hard bop tenor saxophonist and flautist. His career is marked by his collaboration with Thelonious Monk, which lasted for more than ten years.
Biography
Rouse was born in Was ...
- sax
S
*
Joe Sample
Joseph Leslie Sample (February 1, 1939 – September 12, 2014) was an American keyboardist and composer. He was one of the founding members of The Jazz Crusaders in 1960, the band which shortened its name to "The Crusaders" in 1971. He remained ...
Rhoda Scott
Rhoda Scott (born July 3, 1938) is an American soul jazz organist.
Scott was first attracted to the organ in her father’s church at age seven. "It's really the most beautiful instrument in the world", she stated in a 2002 interview. "The firs ...
- organ
*
Shirley Scott
Shirley Scott (March 14, 1934 – March 10, 2002) was an American jazz organist. Her music was noted for its mixture of bebop, blues and gospel elements. She was known by the nickname "Queen of the Organ".
Life and career
Scott was born in Phi ...
- organ
*
Woody Shaw
Woody Herman Shaw Jr. (December 24, 1944 – May 10, 1989) was an American jazz trumpeter, flugelhornist, cornetist, composer, arranger, band leader, and educator. Shaw is widely known as one of the most important and influential jazz trumpet ...
- trumpet
*
Sahib Shihab
Sahib Shihab (born Edmund Gregory; June 23, 1925 – October 24, 1989) was an American jazz and hard bop saxophonist (baritone, alto, and soprano) and flautist. He variously worked with Luther Henderson, Thelonious Monk, Fletcher Henderson, ...
- sax, flute
*
Wayne Shorter
Wayne Shorter (born August 25, 1933) is an American jazz saxophonist and composer. Shorter came to prominence in the late 1950s as a member of, and eventually primary composer for, Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers. In the 1960s, he joined Miles Dav ...
- sax
*
Horace Silver
Horace Ward Martin Tavares Silver (September 2, 1928 – June 18, 2014) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and arranger, particularly in the hard bop style that he helped pioneer in the 1950s.
After playing tenor saxophone and piano at sc ...
- piano
*
Zoot Sims
John Haley "Zoot" Sims (October 29, 1925 – March 23, 1985) was an American jazz saxophonist, playing mainly tenor but also alto (and, later, soprano) saxophone. He first gained attention in the "Four Brothers" sax section of Woody Herman's big ...
Dr. Lonnie Smith
Lonnie Smith (July 3, 1942 – September 28, 2021), styled Dr. Lonnie Smith, was an American jazz Hammond B3 organist who was a member of the George Benson quartet in the 1960s. He recorded albums with saxophonist Lou Donaldson for Blue Note be ...
- organ
*
Melvin Sparks
Melvin Sparks (March 22, 1946 – March 15, 2011) was an American soul jazz, hard bop and jazz blues guitarist. He recorded a number of albums for Prestige Records, later recording for Savant Records. He appeared on several recordings with musici ...
- guitar
*
James Spaulding
James Ralph Spaulding Jr. (born July 30, 1937) is an American jazz saxophonist and flutist.
Born in Indianapolis, Indiana, United states, Spaulding attended the Chicago Cosmopolitan School of Music. Between 1957 and 1961, he was a member of Sun ...
- saxophone
*
Leon Spencer
Leon Spencer (November 1, 1945 – March 11, 2012) was an American jazz organist from Houston, Texas. He played piano with David Newman and organ with Melvin Sparks. Spencer recorded for Prestige in the early 1970s with Buddy Caldwell, Idris Muha ...
*Grady Tate - drums
*Art Taylor - drums
*Billy Taylor - piano
*Henri Texier - double-bass
*Lucky Thompson - sax
*The Three Sounds
*Bobby Timmons - piano
*Andrzej Trzaskowski - piano
*Stanley Turrentine - sax
*Tommy Turrentine - trumpet
*McCoy Tyner - piano
V
*Harold Vick - sax, flute
W
*Freddie Waits - drums
*Mal Waldron - piano
*Winston Walls - organ
*Cedar Walton - piano
*Wilbur Ware - double-bass
*Butch Warren - double-bass
*Kenny Washington (musician), Kenny Washington - drums
*Peter Washington - double-bass
*Doug Watkins - double-bass
*Julius Watkins - French horn
*Michael Weiss (composer), Michael Weiss - piano
*Randy Weston - piano
*Mark Whitfield - guitar
*Don Wilkerson - sax
*Baby Face Willette - organ
*Buster Williams - double-bass
*Tony Williams (drummer), Tony Williams - drums
*Jack Wilson (jazz pianist), Jack Wilson - piano
*Ben Wolfe - bass
*Phil Woods - sax, clarinet
*Reggie Workman - double-bass
*Richard Wyands - piano
Y
*Larry Young (jazz), Larry Young - organ
Z
*Joe Zawinul - piano, keyboards
Notes
{{Jazz
Jazz musicians by genre, Hard bop
Hard bop musicians,
Lists of jazz musicians, Hard bop