McCoy Tyner at Kongsberg Jazz festival 1973

McCoy Tyner, one of the great jazz pianists, died last week. A cornerstone of John Coltrane’s seminal 1960s quartet, he was, with his his rich percussive style,  as influential as Coltrane in shaping the jazz of following half century. Tyner, Coltrane once observed, ‘holds down the harmonies, and that allows me to forget them. He’s sort of the one who gives me wings and lets me take off from the ground from time to time.’

As a tribute to Tyner, I thought I’d put together my favourite jazz piano albums, a track from each, arranged in chronological order, beginning with Art Tatum, the first great jazz pianist. Enjoy.

Art Tatum, ‘Tiger Rag’
from Piano Starts Here (1933/1949)

Ahmad Jamal Trio, ‘Poinciana’
from Live at the Pershing (1958)

Thelonious Monk, ‘Blue Monk’
from Alone in San Francisco (1959)

Bill Evans ‘My man’s gone now’
from Sunday at the Vanguard (1961)

Duke Ellington, ‘Caravan’
from Money Jungle (1962)

Oscar Peterson, ‘C jam blues’
from Night Train (1963)

Cecil Taylor, ‘Steps’
from Unit Structures (1966)

MyCoy Tyner, ‘Contemplation’
from The Real McCoy (1967)

Keith Jarrett, ‘Part 1’
from The Köln Concert (1975)

Carla Bley, ‘Utviklingssang’
from Trios (2013)

The photo of McCopy Tyner is by Gisle Hannemyr licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Generic licence.