What is the best Blue Note hard bop album?

Horace Silver's 1965 Blue Note album fuses hard bop with Afro-Cuban and gospel influences — the most melodically memorable hard bop record ever made.

Lee Morgan's 1964 Blue Note album spawned the boogaloo title track that became one of jazz's biggest hits — irresistibly swinging hard bop with a funky, danceable groove.

Sonny Clark's 1958 Blue Note album features the most hip, laid-back hard bop playing imaginable — relaxed but burning, with Art Farmer and Jackie McLean sharing the front line.

Horace Silver's 1959 Blue Note album is joyful, funky hard bop anchored by the pianist's infectious grooves and the Blue Mitchell/Junior Cook front line.

Hank Mobley's 1960 Blue Note album features his most focused and swinging hard bop performances alongside Freddie Hubbard in one of the label's finest pairings.

Dexter Gordon's 1962 Blue Note date is the definitive document of his post-prison comeback — big-toned, loose-limbed hard bop that makes a case for Gordon as the label's most charismatic tenor.

Jimmy Smith's 1957-58 Blue Note recordings made the Hammond B-3 organ a jazz instrument — gospel-rooted, blues-soaked hard bop with an irresistible low-end groove.

Lou Donaldson's 1958 Blue Note album is joyful, hard-swinging hard bop full of blues feeling and easy authority — among the most reliably satisfying records in the label's catalog.

Freddie Hubbard's 1961 Blue Note debut set the template for the most technically dazzling trumpet playing in hard bop — assertive, explosive, and endlessly inventive.

Lee Morgan's 1965 Blue Note album is a perfectly balanced hard bop program — the Lee-Morgan-Hank-Mobley front line at its most soulful, with Lee's trumpet blazing throughout.