What is the best Blue Note hard bop album?

Hard bop took bebop's complexity and added blues, gospel, and funk into the mix — resulting in some of the most swinging jazz ever recorded. Which hard bop album on Blue Note is the best?

Moanin'

Art Blakey & The Jazz Messengers' 1958 Blue Note album is the definitive hard bop recording — Bobby Timmons' gospel-blues title track and Blakey's explosive drumming set the standard.

1/13

Soul Station

Hank Mobley's 1960 Blue Note album is a masterclass in hard bop elegance — four perfectly balanced tracks featuring one of the genre's most underrated tenor saxophonists.

2/13

Blue Train

John Coltrane's 1957 Blue Note session is raw, bluesy hard bop from a saxophonist on the cusp of his modal breakthrough — direct, powerful, and deeply soulful.

3/13

Song for My Father

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.

4/13

The Sidewinder

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.

5/13

Cool Struttin'

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.

6/13

Blowin' the Blues Away

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.

7/13

Roll Call

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.

8/13

Go!

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.

9/13

The Sermon!

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.

10/13

Blues Walk

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.

11/13

Ready for Freddie

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.

12/13

Cornbread

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.

13/13