Jazz listeners expect their heroes to play the long game, so a box of 75 singles tracks from jazz’s most famous label might sound almost frivolous. But for all its memorable (and memorably designed) albums, Blue Note has always been in the singles business – heavyweights like Thelonious Monk, Miles Davis and John Coltrane released them, and creative idiom-colliders like Robert Glasper and Derrick Hodge reach out to new audiences via downloads today. This five-CD set is a companion to Thames & Hudson’s glamorous book of the same title, and Glasper, Hodge, Jason Moran and others star in a Blue Note celebration at the London jazz festival on 22 November. This box isn’t aimed at old jazz hands, but offers newcomers a wealth of succinctly delivered diversity. Sidney Bechet’s shimmering, snarling 1939 version of Summertime, Monk’s stuttering, skidding, three-minute Thelonious, and Herbie Hancock’s ever-irresistible Watermelon Man are among 60 or so jazz classics, and if the final disc’s sweep across classic funk and contemporary pop has some lightweight moments, charismatic newer recruits such as Glasper, Bobby McFerrin, Cassandra Wilson and Gregory Porter make sure there aren’t that many.
