who is the hippest jazz player in the universe?

[Groyniad]

You know, on so many categories there could be a real debate. Who was the most innovative? Who was the most versatile?

But "hip" for me led precisely to one, and only one conclusion, with which I know the OP will agree.

If you say "most hip ever" in the context of guitar, even if I had full frontal lobe brain damage from some catastrophic accident, I would arise from my coma, and with wild eyes glaring, shout out:

WES MONTGOMERY-SMOKIN AT THE HALF-NOTE

I am unable to even imagine an alternative to consider. This album defined something, established something, and I simply can't get away from it's utter dominance in jazz guitar hipness, and sure, even general hipness.

I can't recall where I read it, but someone once praised a caucasian pianist by asking, "How could a guy look like Leonard Feather and play like Wynton Kelly?"

i am with you very very much on this

but i'm not meaning to say it only in the context of guitar - hence my proposal - wynton kelly

i do think the fact that EVERYONE wanted him on their records means a great deal - they knew no-one else could do as much for the hip-factor of the record

[Groyniad]

in a way the whole point is to contrast hip with deep and heavy and total-genius etc.

jim hall is not hip certainly not in the way wes is hip

but you could (just about) think he was a more creative jazz artist (or something - i'm not saying i think this is true)

i love the jo jones vote - what a solo - and his face is just fantastic! so happy and chilled (happy and chilled equals hip?)

keep them coming!

[Groyniad]

after listening to 'it never entered my mind' for the xieth time

i change my vote to miles

what can i say - i was wrong before

(that happens a lot i find)

[jbucklin]

Lester Young. Legend has it that he invented the word "hip", along with "dig" and many other jazz/slang terms. I read that he even named NYC the Big Apple. But these things are not what made him hip. Just listening to him will reveal what made him so. He sums up what is so hip about jazz.

[Groyniad]

Lester Young. Legend has it that he invented the word "hip", along with "dig" and many other jazz/slang terms. I read that he even named NYC the Big Apple. But these things are not what made him hip. Just listening to him will reveal what made him so. He sums up what is so hip about jazz.

i just feel bad i didn't say this instead of what i said

it would be just the best thing ever if he invented the word too

[Groyniad]

maybe its dean martin?

[hanktx]

Mickey Baker. And possibly several others. But, I'm going with Mickey Baker.

[lawson-stone]

I always wonder in threads like this why Dizzy Gillespie never gets mentioned? When I think if "hip" as a social and cultural characteristic, Dizzy Gillespie simply arises like an ancient Titan emerging unbegotten from the primordial soup.

Diz "was" hipness.

[Greentone]

This may seem weird, but for a long time the Chairman of the Board was pretty darned hip. From the 40s to the 50s into the 60s and a bit beyond, Sinatra drove trends in music, film, literature, you name it. He was the whole package. The guy could sing and he knew his music inside/out. From all accounts he wasn't just some ear singer who needed his note at the beginning of each tune. Like Ella, Sarah, etc., the guy could get it done--both in the studio and on the road. The Beatles and Presley were derivative phenomena, in terms of pandemonium. They inherited their cyclonic treatment from fans, industry and the media directly from Sinatra. And, listen to the way he does material like "I thought about you." He has it down.

[Greentone]

Follow up: I'm sure some of us have accompanied singers that, to put it generously, were high maintenance. They were essentially insecure about their ignorance of music and covered it up with arrogance and a bullying demeanor. It's great when you can work with people that can (a) really sing, and (b) really know music--the way an instrumentalist would.

I've been accompanying singers this week who you can stick sheet music in front of and BAM! Music happens. It's nice.

[Cunamara]

T.S Monk

[Greentone]

Now, if you insist on players, I will give you the Leonard Feather response: Charlie Christian, Wes Montgomery, Jimi Hendrix--if you prune the tree of jazz guitar, that's what you are left with. Pretty flippin' hip players.

[neatomic]

Lester Young. Legend has it that he invented the word "hip", along with "dig" and many other jazz/slang terms. I read that he even named NYC the Big Apple. But these things are not what made him hip. Just listening to him will reveal what made him so. He sums up what is so hip about jazz.

first guy i thought of as well..pork pie hat...named billie- lady day..natty dresser..bent horn...unique mind blowing tone...hipster supreme

cheers

[princeplanet]

Hip attitudes, or hip lines? Hip compositions maybe? Hmm, Prez was the first hipster, right? So yeah, you gotta say Bird and Diz were pretty hip, I mean everyone wanted to be them... But of the people I know about after that who I'd say were hip as all f*ck, you gotta mention Dexter, Sonny Rollins, Charles Mingus, Jackie Maclean, Art Blakey, Bobby Timmons, Clifford Jordan, Eric Dolphy, Ornette, and yeah, Miles, naturally....

edit - Oh yeah, I forgot Thelonius Monk! , and......

[destinytot]

Curtis:

[destinytot]

Osiris contender, Shirley:

[lawson-stone]

i'm too young to be totally crazy about frank sinatra

but i'm totally crazy about frank sinatra

i've been listening recently a lot to his - without a song
and his - lonesome road
it is one of the great consolations - seems to me - that sinatra himself - singing the songbook - was the first and greatest 'pop star'

thank god someone was able to do the job of getting the songs to the people effectively (i know he didn't do it alone)

so nelson riddle is a contender too

I love Sinatra. At my daughter's wedding I had some input on the playlist for the wedding reception dancing, and I loaded it with Sinatra. I was keenly disappointed that our Daddy-Daughter dance song, "I'm Old Fashioned" was apparently one of the the few standards Sinatra had not covered. At least I never found it.

[Stuart Elliott]

Maybe, John Pizzarelli, he's so hip he plays Mack the Knife at the right time.

[Groyniad]

Hip attitudes, or hip lines? Hip compositions maybe? Hmm, Prez was the first hipster, right? So yeah, you gotta say Bird and Diz were pretty hip, I mean everyone wanted to be them... But of the people I know about after that who I'd say were hip as all f*ck, you gotta mention Dexter, Sonny Rollins, Charles Mingus, Jackie Maclean, Art Blakey, Bobby Timmons, Clifford Jordan, Eric Dolphy, Ornette, and yeah, Miles, naturally....

edit - Oh yeah, I forgot Thelonius Monk! , and......

absolutely right - that's a good round up of properly hip people

but its not a boring list

because e.g. paul desmond is not on it - nor is stan getz or bill evans or even chet baker or lee konitz or barney kessel or

there are many really great players who one would not think to put on a serious hip list

(even though compared to everything else happening in the non-jazz world they are all hip stars)

[christianm77]

I was listening to Earl Fatha Hines today. I think he's pretty damn hip. Check it:

So you are thinking ... OK stride piano... he sets up the expectation, and then he wreaks rhythmic and harmonic havoc in his second and third chorus. What a badass. No wonder Bird was influenced by him.

[christianm77]

Monk is the hippest tho.

[Groyniad]

yes - monk is the hippest - i change my mind again

i've gone

wynton
miles

and now i'm saying monk

definitely monk

dig the hines too

i love being so confused about who is the hippest

(i think i might end up with bill evans - even though most people would say he was on a different list. he out blows miles, cannonball and coltrane on that stella session there - every single take he does. his rhythmical inventiveness is just out of this world e.g.:

[Groyniad]

of course you're right c77 - i'm talking about what people are likely to think rather than about what i really think (that should be okay as long as its clear)

paul desmond is mental

and so is jim hall (though in the last twenty years or so he wasn't always it has to be said)

and - as i just said - i think bill evans might be the hippest player ever because no-one plays time so hard as he does - i don't think (except maybe monk)

but - listening as i now am to sonny rollins playing toot toot tootsie goodbye - i have to say that for me it is sonny rollins in the late fifties that makes me feel that i am in the presence of the coolest possible force in nature

always has - and always will. there is NO attitude like sonny rollins attitude. (not even dexter's attitude is quite as enormous as sonny's)

god i love sonny rollins

[neatomic]

three hip lesters

miles diggin lester-



lester and lady day-



blowin-



cheers

[rictroll]