Best jazz tracks to test your system
Billy Cobham Stratus
Renowned drummer and notorious musical risk-taker Cobham is, naturally, the engine-room here – but the overall balance of Stratus is perfect for testing the way your system approaches a fiercely complicated recording. Drums, percussion, keyboards, acoustic and electric bass, horns and wind instruments all take a turn – and when they’re all chipping in simultaneously your system will need to demonstrate all its powers of resolution to keep this virtuoso fist-fight in check.
Thelonious Monk Body And Soul
Monk’s unique improvisational style is at its most questioning when tackling a classic like this, where the combination of stabbing attack, unpredictable note releases and hesitations makes for fascinating (if not always the most relaxing) listening. This solo piano piece is alive with tiny details in its oddball key choices, periodic silences and glissandos. The attacks and decays are unique to Monk, but if your set-up can’t dish the details he’ll end up sounding more like Les Dawson.
John Coltrane Alabama
On September 15th 1963, the Ku Klux Klan killed four Africanamerican girls by bombing the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. John Coltrane’s lament/eulogy/ rebuttal of the event is one of the most aching, resolute and indomitable pieces of music you’ll ever hear. And in terms of its impact, timing is everything – your system must describe the interplay between the musicians (and the horror that’s audible in Coltrane’s playing) to give the piece its full weight of import.
Rahsaan Roland Kirk Blacknuss
Not too many horn specialists routinely play three instruments at a time. So when surrounded by an extensive ensemble celebrating the black notes of the keyboard, Kirk’s music becomes among the most frantic examinations of your system’s dynamic ability you’ll hear.
Blacknuss starts quietly, gets louder, gets louder still – and then fluctuates between those states for as long as it feels like it. Can your system keep up? No? Time to start auditioning new components.