A strong eye and ear opener to go with your coffee and breakfast, “Baghdad Blues” is an uptempo workout composed by Don Newey and recorded by the Horace Silver Quintet. Silver is a wonderful pianist and on this track (and much of the superlative 1959 album Blowin’ the Blues Away) he shows his usual fine eye as a bandleader by assembling the swinging quintet of Junior Cook on tenor sax, the estimable Blue Mitchell on trumpet, Gene Taylor on Bass and Louis Hayes on the skins.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Fxkd1NWWCA

Like so much of Horace Silver’s classic work, there is an effortless virtuosity to the Baghdad Blues. He also demonstrates the undervalued leader’s quality of selflessness: the solos are concise and spread around democratically. The song scoots along at a nice clip and circles back to it’s brassy bridge several times before jumping off again into ecstatic excellence. Best of all, he’s still going strong at 84. If he comes to your town, be sure to check out one of the living legends of Jazz.

Horace Silver Bio & Discography from the outstanding Allmusic.com.

Plug it into your Pandora or download it from iTunes or Amazon.

A groovy, near 11-minute workout by the Master of the Sax relatively early in his career as a leader, “Dahomey Dance” features an all-star backing ensemble of Eric Dolphy on alto sax, Freddie Hubbard on trumpet, McCoy Tyner on piano, Art Davis & Reggie Workman on bass and the inimitable Elvin Jones on the backbeat.

Originally released on the “Olé” album in 1961 but also available on the Atlantic Coltrane omnibus “The Heavyweight Champion” (among other compilations), this track is accessible to any listener and, most importantly, really swings with a loping groove and concise solos.  It’s long but somehow over before you want it to be. “Dahomey Dance” is what a great mellow jazz tune should be: smooth, full of soul and exhibiting superb collaborative musicianship. You owe it to yourself to check it out.

Plug it into your Pandora or download it from iTunes or Amazon.

The best Miles Davis album not officially authored by Miles Davis, Cannonball Adderly’s seminal  “Somethin’ Else” from 1958  belongs in every well rounded man’s jazz collection (you do have a jazz collection, dontcha pal?). It oozes class, can be listened to regularly throughout all the years of your life and is also a great makeout album guaranteed to impress hip chicks.  And aside from all that, it is absolutely some of the best music ever laid down on magnetic tape by the human race.

Plug it into your Pandora or download it from iTunes or Amazon (free samples here):

Once those first slinky, film noir notes from “Autumn Leaves” begin, you’ll know your music collection just took a big step up in class, my friend.

(Pro tip: Spring for the Rudy Van Gelder edition.  The warm remix by Blue Note’s master engineer will wrap you in a cocoon of cool.)