Bill Evans

Bill Evans remains a huge influence on modernday jazz pianists. He came to the fore in the late 1950s with the Miles Davis Sextet, and co-wrote and played on their 1959 album Kind of Blue, perhaps the most famous acoustic jazz record of all time. Evans used the impressionist influences of Debussy and Ravel to craft a new, more “open” chord voicing method, which together with his relaxed sensibility was well suited to the “cool jazz” pioneered by Davis at the time. He also went on to record as a leader in various lineups, most famously in trios with bassists including Scott LaFaro, Gary Peacock, and Marc Johnson, and drummers including Paul Motian, Jack DeJohnette, and Joe La Barbera. Evans also unselfishly shared the spotlight with the other members of his trios, another way he influenced the many pianists who followed in his footsteps.

Recommended listening:

• Kind of Blue by Miles Davis, 1959 (Columbia/Legacy)
• Sunday at the Village Vanguard, 1961 (Riverside/OJC)
• Conversations With Myself, 1963 (Verve)