In the mid-1950s the sounds of bebop began to be blended with the influence of rhythm and blues and gospel music, to create a funkier type of music with simpler melodies and a more overt blues influence.
Some view this as a conscious move towards a more Afrocentric sound as a reaction against Cool jazz, which placed relatively little emphasis upon the blues.
Blue Note Records released many of the artists pioneering this new sound: Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers (initially with Horace Silver on piano – Silver’s church-influenced ‘The Preacher’ is a good example of the style), Lee Morgan, Freddie Hubbard, Hank Mobley, Donald Byrd and others.
Trumpeter Clifford Brown’s group with Max Roach was also extremely important, as was Miles Davis’s First Great Quintet.
An extension of hard bop is soul jazz, which places more importance upon the influence of gospel music and rhythm and blues. It became popular in the mid/late 1960s, often featuring the sound of the Hammond organ.
Key hard bop albums
John Coltrane – Blue Train Lazy Bird
Horace Silver – Song for my Father Song for my Father
Hank Mobley – Soul Stations This I Dig Of You
Sonny Rollins – Saxophone Colossus St. Thomas
