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Explore jazz by genre and region
From swing, bebop and bossa nova to contemporary jazz, discover recordings and artists through musical styles and regional scenes.
Genre and regional labels are starting points for discovery. A musician or a recording may belong to several musical currents at once.
Jazz
Music that emerged in New Orleans in the early twentieth century. It has continually changed through encounters with musical cultures around the world, giving rise to many different branches.
Start with a recording:The Peaceful Side of Jazz / Jazz in Silhouette
New Orleans Jazz
An early form of jazz bringing together brass-band music, ragtime and blues, with collective improvisation as a defining feature.
Start with a recording:The Hot Five Sessions / Louis Armstrong Plays W.C. Handy
Swing
The sound of the big-band dance era, represented by figures such as Duke Ellington and Count Basie.
Start with a recording:At the Cotton Club / One O'Clock Jump
Gypsy Jazz
A style that developed in Paris through the meeting of Romani string traditions and American jazz, shaped by Django Reinhardt.
Start with a recording:Djangology (Quintette du Hot Club de France) / Nuages
Bebop
An innovative turn toward music for close listening, characterized by complex harmony and rapid improvisation.
Start with a recording:Ko-Ko / Groovin' High
Afro-Cuban Jazz
A genre born from the meeting of bebop and Cuban clave rhythms in New York.
Cool Jazz
A style exploring softer, more restrained textures in contrast to the intensity of bebop.
Start with a recording:Chet Baker Sings / Birth of the Cool
Hard Bop
A forceful, earthy development of bebop that brought blues and gospel feeling to the foreground.
Start with a recording:Brilliant Corners / Giant Steps
Modal Jazz
An approach to improvisation based on modes rather than sequences of chord changes, exemplified by Kind of Blue.
Start with a recording:Kind of Blue / A Love Supreme
Bossa Nova
Music that emerged in Rio de Janeiro, bringing samba’s rhythmic sensibility into dialogue with the harmonies associated with cool jazz.
Start with a recording:Getz/Gilberto / Chega de Saudade
Free Jazz
A radical approach to jazz that seeks freedom from predetermined chord progressions and conventional structures.
Start with a recording:Free Jazz: A Collective Improvisation / Out to Lunch!
Brazilian Jazz
An ongoing meeting of jazz improvisation and Brazil’s musical languages beyond bossa nova, including forró and Afro-Brazilian traditions.
Start with a recording:Butterfly Dreams / Fingers
Fusion
A development of jazz incorporating rock and funk rhythms alongside electric instruments.
Start with a recording:Head Hunters / Return to Forever
Nordic Jazz
A sound often associated with the quiet atmosphere of Nordic folk music and spacious resonance. The ECM label helped bring it to international audiences.
Start with a recording:Belonging / Witchi-Tai-To
Argentine Jazz
Jazz from Argentina in which the emotional language of tango meets approaches developed from bebop onward.
Start with a recording:Libertango / Chapter Two: Hasta Siempre
Azerbaijani Jazz
A distinctive musical language shaped by encounters between mugham, a modal tradition, and jazz improvisation.
Start with a recording:Waiting for Aziza / Aziza Mustafa Zadeh
Cape Jazz
A style formed through the meeting of South African urban musical cultures and American jazz from the swing era onward, with deep connections to the struggle against apartheid.
Start with a recording:Mannenberg (Is Where It's Happening) / The Promise of a Future
Japanese Jazz
Japan’s postwar jazz scene developed in part through club culture around US military bases. From the 1970s, some musicians increasingly incorporated Japanese traditional music into their work.
Israeli Jazz
A scene that gained international attention from the 1990s, bringing melodic elements of klezmer and Mizrahi music into jazz languages developed from the modal era onward.
Start with a recording:Adama / Notes from the Village
Contemporary Jazz
Jazz in continuing development, drawing together languages shaped by fusion, Nordic jazz and other currents while crossing genre boundaries.
Start with a recording:From Gagarin's Point of View / Radio Music Society
Ragtime
Syncopated piano music that helped prepare the ground for New Orleans jazz. It belongs to jazz’s immediate musical prehistory rather than being jazz itself.
Stride Piano
A piano approach developed from ragtime, with the left hand leaping between bass notes and chords. Players such as Art Tatum expanded its possibilities.
Start with a recording:The Genius of Art Tatum, No. 1 / Piano Starts Here
Kansas City Swing
A blues-rich swing style developed in Kansas City. Associated with Count Basie’s orchestra, it places particular emphasis on improvised solos.
Start with a recording:The Atomic Mr. Basie / April in Paris
Vocal Jazz
Singing rooted in jazz phrasing and improvisation, including instrumental approaches such as scat. Its language developed across the swing and bebop eras.
Start with a recording:Sarah Vaughan with Clifford Brown / Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Cole Porter Song Book
Soul Jazz
An accessible, groove-centered branch of hard bop strongly influenced by gospel and blues, often featuring the Hammond organ.
Start with a recording:Song for My Father / Idle Moments
Post-Bop
A development associated with the mid-1960s Blue Note scene, incorporating modal and free-jazz ideas into hard bop while retaining elements of harmonic structure.
Spiritual Jazz
A current of jazz associated with the late work of John Coltrane, emphasizing meditation and spirituality, often with an interest in African and Indian spiritual traditions.
Start with a recording:Karma / Journey in Satchidananda
Latin Jazz
A broad term for encounters between jazz harmony and Latin American rhythms, including Cuban traditions and the developments of Afro-Cuban jazz.
Start with a recording:Irakere / Discovery: Live at Montreux
Jazz-Funk
A particularly danceable branch of fusion that puts funk grooves and bass lines in the foreground.
Start with a recording:Jaco Pastorius / Heavy Weather
Nu Jazz
A current combining live performance, electronics and club-music rhythms, associated in particular with the Nordic scene of the 1990s.
Start with a recording:Living Magic / Khmer
Hip-Hop Jazz
A current that integrates hip-hop and R&B beats and production into jazz, with prominent developments since the 2000s.
Start with a recording:Black Radio / Black Radio 2
Ethio-Jazz
A style developed by Mulatu Astatke, combining Ethiopia’s pentatonic musical traditions with jazz, Latin music and funk.
Start with a recording:Mulatu of Ethiopia / Sketches of Ethiopia
Indo-Jazz Fusion
An approach bringing the raga and tala systems of Indian classical music into dialogue with jazz improvisation. Shakti, with John McLaughlin and Indian musicians, is a prominent example.
Start with a recording:Shakti / Living Magic
Flamenco Jazz
Music connecting flamenco guitar techniques and rhythmic sensibilities with jazz improvisation. The Guitar Trio featuring Paco de Lucía is one point of reference.
Start with a recording:Friday Night in San Francisco / Lágrimas Negras
Tunisian Jazz
Music bringing North African Arab-Andalusian traditions into dialogue with jazz improvisation, often associated with oud players and a quiet, meditative sensibility.
Start with a recording:Thimar / Divine Shadows
Levantine Jazz
Music combining the modes of Eastern Mediterranean Arabic classical traditions with jazz improvisation, often featuring the oud.
Start with a recording:Blue Camel / Nafas
Polish Jazz
Poland’s jazz scene developed as a relatively open cultural space during the Cold War. Much of its music is associated with lyricism and a cinematic sensibility.
Start with a recording:Litania: Music of Krzysztof Komeda / Soul of Things
Italian Jazz
Italy’s jazz scene brings together lyrical melodic sensibilities and the languages of European free improvisation.
Start with a recording:Easy Living / Tribe
Dutch Jazz
An improvising scene combining humor with avant-garde approaches, with the Instant Composers Pool (ICP) as a central presence.
Start with a recording:Solo / Two For Two
British Jazz
Britain’s jazz scene has developed its own directions while absorbing American jazz. A younger generation led a renewed surge of activity in the late 1980s.
Start with a recording:Journey to the Urge Within / Modern Day Jazz Stories
Third Stream
A term introduced by composer Gunther Schuller in 1957 for music integrating jazz improvisation with twentieth-century classical approaches. It is also discussed in relation to musicians who reinterpret classical works in jazz ensembles.
Start with a recording:Play Bach Vol. 1 / Rokoko Jazz
Choro
Instrumental music that developed in late-nineteenth-century Rio de Janeiro through encounters between European dances and Afro-Brazilian rhythms. Flowing melodies, counterpoint and improvisation helped shape Brazil’s rich musical vocabulary.
Start with a recording:Gente da Antiga / Som Pixinguinha