Blue Note

Dexter Gordon - The Complete Blue Note Sixties Sessions [6 CD Set] (1996) {Blue Note}
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© 1996 Blue Note / Capitol | 7243 8 34200 2 5
Jazz / Hard Bop / Saxophone

The Complete Blue Note Sixties Sessions is an attractive six-disc box set featuring all of Dexter Gordon's '60s recordings for the label in chronological order. Such classic albums as Dexter Calling and Go! were recorded during these years, and they are presented in their entirety, as are two complete sessions that have been previously unavailable on CD and several unreleased alternate takes. For serious Gordon fans and musicologists, it's an essential collection, but its very thoroughness makes it less appealing to casual fans, who would be better off acquiring the individual albums.

Various Artists - Blue Note Explosion: New York Is Our Home (2008) [2CD] {Blue Note}
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© 2008 Blue Note / Capitol / EMI | 50999-521433-0-4
Jazz / Hard Bop

New York Is Our Home brings together twenty tracks recorded by Blue Note artists between 1953-58 which helped shape the hard bop template. The compilation includes a handful of acknowledged early classics, but also some primo lesser-known tracks. Hard bop was at the apex of African-American culture from 1955 to around 1965, when rock and soul drove it from the throne. By the time it declined, the music was heavily, often excessively codified. Between 1954-57, however, when most of the tracks on New York Is Our Home were recorded, everything was still to play for. Horace Silver may be the pianist on ten of these tracks, and Art Blakey the drummer on eight, but the only thing that runs through all of them is African-centric energy, as received through blues and gospel. Beyond that, individual expression is key.

Carmen McRae, Earl Klugh, Blue Note All-Stars - Blue Note Live At The Roxy Vol. 2 (1976) {2012 Japanese BNLA Series TOCJ-50534}
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© 1976, 2012 Blue Note / EMI Music Japan | TOCJ-50534
Jazz / Hard Bop / Post Bop / Soul Jazz / Jazz Funk

An overlooked gem from Blue Note – a special live performance that brings together some of the label's funkiest and most soulful artists of the 70s! The set's somewhat unusual for Blue Note at the time – especially given the label's increasingly studio-driven approach to jazz, with projects by the Mizell Brothers and others – yet given that bent, the whole thing's a great illustration of the vibrancy of all these artists always from the studio – playing live and extremely funky!

Jimmy Smith - The Complete Sermon Sessions (2009) {2CD Set Groove Hut Records–Blue Note rec 1957-1958}
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© 1957-58, 2009 Blue Note / Groove Hut Records | GH 66712
Jazz / Hard Bop / Soul Jazz / Organ Hammond B-3

2009 release from the Jazz great containing Smith's complete classic Sermon sessions, in chronological order, together for the first time ever on a single set. These are his only preserved collaborations with Lee Morgan, the formidable trumpet player whose life came to a tragic end after being shot by his girlfriend at the tender age of 33. Tenor saxophonist Tina Brooks is also featured here. The outstanding reedman would pass away at the age of 42 after a life of drug addiction and self abuse. The great Jimmy Smiths was a Jazz musician whose performances on the Hammond B-3 electric organ helped to popularize this instrument.