Recommend me some great jazz guitar albums please!

I think this is an essential - Wes Montgomery and the Wynton Kelly Trio.



Here I would also recommend the cd version as it has added material of great value compared to the lp.

 

Charlie Byrd is a personal favourite. Much prefer this to fusion.

 

Mary Halvorson - any of her albums, really, but "Thumbscrew" from a couple of years back is a good place to start.

 

Saved me the trouble. Wish more jazz guitarists would inhabit a tone like this.

 

A jazz guitar album covering The Stones, thanks to stellar arrangements and the brilliant playing of Joe Pass it's actually become one of my favorite jazz albums.

 

Git yerself some Danny Gatton. He's was an absolute monster on guitar.

 

First of all, this:



And any other Ralph solo thing, for that matter.

Wes Montgomery - In Paris: The Definitive ORTF Recording. This was a fairly recent release -- LPs might be hard to get right now, but CDs should be easier.

Pat Metheny - Question And Answer, and all his other trio work.

Bill Frisell. All the Paul Motian Trio releases are worth having. Frisell is more into Americana these days, but there's always a hint of Jim Hall and Monk in his playing. The earlier the recording, the closer Bill was to jazz, though he was never a straight-ahead player to my knowledge.

 

Just picked this up, and it's great.

 

Philip Catherine- Live
Crystal Bells- Chet Baker, Philip Catherine, Jean-Louis Rassinfosse.
Jim Hall- Concerto.

 

There are a few Jim Hall recommendations already, which I wholeheartedly second. This other one, from the same year 1975/76 as and with the same line-up than Jim Hall Live!, I don't think is very easy to find, but IMO is even awesome-r than JHL! This trio really, really rocks, and the sound is great! (No dirty plates being shuffled about noisily by the night club busboy, lol!)



Some jazz guitar fans don't go for Jim's very special approach (both understated and harmonically very bold). Since the OP likes Jimmy Raney in particular, Johnny Smith, Joe Pass and Howard Roberts are other greats to discover, in the more classic/standard vein. I particularly like Pass's Intercontinental.

 

Julian Lage - Arclight

 

Gabor Szabo...



...Jazz Raga is also really good. I found three or four of his albums in various places over the last few years.

 

Bedrock.

 

Wayne Krantz

 

Really nice, despite the horrendous cover art.

 

w/ Jaco Pastorius

 

Some real good guitar playing by Jim Hall on the record Studio Trieste, with Chet Baker, Hubert Laws, and Ron Carter.