John Coltrane: Mojo's ranking of his ten best albums

To mark the centenary of John Coltrane's birth, British magazine Mojo pays tribute to the great jazz composer with an in-depth feature, complete with a top ten of his best albums. "In the beginning," Mojo recalls, "Coltrane was just one of many young saxophonists who came up musically in the 1940s, deeply influenced by Charlie 'Bird' Parker and his long, agile, lightning-fast runs of notes. Coltrane worked with masters like Dizzy Gillespie and with rhythm & blues stars such as Eddie 'Cleanhead' Vinson. His first professional recording dates back to 1949, but it was above all thanks to his intermittent and often turbulent collaboration with Miles Davis between 1955 and 1960 that the jazz world truly began to take notice of him." With Davis he took part in landmark albums such as "'Round About Midnight", "Milestones" and "Kind Of Blue", destined to become one of the most celebrated and best-selling jazz records of all time. "When in 1957 Coltrane's problems with heroin and alcohol caused a rift with Davis," the magazine continues, "it was Thelonious Monk who took him in at New York's Five Spot. Coltrane managed to get clean, went through a phase of extraordinary artistic growth, and shortly afterwards returned to play with Davis, while simultaneously launching his own career as a bandleader. His stature as a tenor and soprano saxophonist remains almost impossible to match: a full, instantly recognisable sound capable of unleashing astonishing energy even through a single note. When those notes multiplied into the dizzying runs that became one of his trademarks, the effect could be dazzling. What set him apart even further was his growing pursuit of a spiritual dimension in music."
In the ten years between 1957 and his death from liver cancer in 1967, Mojo notes, Coltrane moved from mainstream jazz to the avant-garde, eventually becoming an almost shamanic figure, projected beyond the very boundaries of musical language.

Here, then, is Mojo's ranking of John Coltrane's 10 best albums (full feature here).

10. John Coltrane – Blue Train
9. Thelonious Monk Quartet With John Coltrane – At Carnegie Hall
8. John Coltrane – Soultrane
7. The Miles Davis Quintet feat. John Coltrane – All Of You: The Last Tour 1960
6. John Coltrane – Giant Steps
5. John Coltrane – My Favorite Things
4. The John Coltrane Quartet – Africa/Brass
3. John Coltrane – Live At The Village Vanguard
2. John Coltrane – Ascension
1. John Coltrane – A Love Supreme

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