Favourite Jazz Saxophonists – Contemporary Stars!

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Contemporary Jazz Saxophone Heavyweight: Joshua Redman
Saxophonist: Joshua Redman – Photo Credit: Tore Sætre (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Following on from my previous “Favourite Jazz Saxophonists – The Greats” post here’s part two as promised focusing on contemporary artists. Hopefully it will provide you with a useful introduction to some fantastic and inspiring musicians, all of whom are well worth checking out.

With this playlist I’ve tried to create a selection that covers a wide range of players and styles, and if you listen carefully you will hear that all of them have learnt from the Past Masters like the ones featured in my previous “Favourites” post.

Favourite Jazz Saxophonists – The Greats!

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The great saxophonist, Charlie Parker with band.
The great Charlie Parker and band, with a young Miles Davis!

As you’ll have probably seen from this website already I like the analogy that Jazz is a “Language”. We all know that when studying any language learning the written form will only get you part of the way there. You need to understand the inflections (articulation, swing), the way it flows and cadences (phrasing), as well as it’s structure (harmony, voice leading). See what I am getting at? We need to learn how to “speak” Jazz!

Luckily not only do we have great masters both past and present to learn the art of jazz improvisation from, but we live in a time where we practically have unlimited access to recordings and videos online. Bearing that in mind, there has probably never been a better time to learn jazz saxophone because of these available resources!