When Jazz Met Photography Met Design

Written by John Kennerdell

Even if you don't share the view that jazz reached its high-water mark in the couple decades following World War II, can there be much doubt that the art of the album cover did? Those big square sleeves offered the perfect showcase for mid-20th-century graphics and photography, and the best of them still stand as small masterpieces of design.

To be fair, a lot of the most memorable covers relied mainly or entirely on illustrations or typography. But there was plenty of photography too, some of it famous, some all but forgotten. So here's a modest taxonomy of the postwar jazz album cover photograph, with what I take to be a prime example of each type. Not everyone will agree with my taste in either photography or music, but at minimum I'd say they're all worth a look and a listen even to non-jazz fans. Jazz people, you'll know most or all of them.

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Chet Baker Quartet Featuring Russ Freeman, 1953. Photograph by William Claxton. That's Freeman at the piano and Chet playing his horn behind him. Claxton had begun photographing Baker in 1952 and was to make him a kind of personal project for the next five years. "After those first few golden years," said Claxton, "it seemed as though he was always on the run—usually away from the law, or else running to find a score."

The session shot
The session shot is what you think of when you think of jazz photography: the musician in action, all spotlights and cigarette smoke and chiaroscuro. In fact surprisingly few of the really good ones ended up on the covers of jazz albums, at least at the time. If you want a great session photo matched to a great record, the best I can do is Herman Leonard's glorious shot of Dexter Gordon on the saxophonist's Ballads, a compilation from 1991. But that's cheating.

Sticking to records from the period, perhaps most iconic (it even appeared on a U.S. postage stamp) is David Gahr's cover shot on A Tribute to Jack Johnson by Miles Davis. That would be a rather divisive choice though, given that it's a soundtrack album as well as, shall we say, a bit outside of many people's definition of jazz.

So I'm going with a dark horse: an early Chet Baker recording with a cover shot by William Claxton, a man up there with Leonard and Francis Wolff as the top session photographers of them all. In fitting with the West Coast cool of the music it's almost formally geometric in its lines, with the top of the grand piano angling down to create a background for the title. It wasn't surprising to find that Claxton did the design as well.

Chet has taken more than his share of criticism from some quarters, not least because his early popularity owed much to his absurdly photogenic looks, mainly as seen through Claxton's lens. But listen to this album with an open mind and you'll hear a wonderfully natural musician, relaxed and inventive and always expressive. You'll also get plenty of exceptionally tasty piano from Russ Freeman, one of the unsung masters of the instrument.

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Sunday at the Village Vanguard, Bill Evans Trio, 1961. Photograph by Donald Silverstein. In his short life (1934-1975) New York-born Silverstein burned bright. He spent a few years in Paris with French Vogue and then moved to the London of the Swinging '60s, where he worked alongside Bailey, Donovan, and Duffy. Amid a busy career in fashion, advertising, and editorial photography he shot dozens of jazz musicians but is best remembered for a single 1967 session with Jimi Hendrix.

The studio portrait
While there were some fine studio cover shots of musicians holding their horns or sitting at their pianos or drums—I like the skinny young Ornette Coleman hugging his plastic sax on The Shape of Jazz to Come—more interesting things tended to happen when the photographer took the instrument away. You begin to see the person behind the musician.

This one was an easy pick. Silverstein's portrait of Bill Evans has an immediacy to it that I've never seen in another shot of the pianist. He looks serious and intense, as he always did, but also vulnerable, almost frail. His hands reach out as if for a keyboard. The frame numbers written on the one published contact sheet suggest that the photographer shot at least eight rolls on his Hasselblad. By the end, when this one appears to have been taken, poor Bill probably just wanted to get back to his piano. Knowing as we do the demons he would face over the remaining 20 years of his life, it's a haunting image.

A contact sheet from the shoot

As for the music, I admit a preference for Bill's studio albums, most of all Portrait In Jazz, but that cover shot isn't nearly as interesting. And as live piano trio recordings go, this one pretty much sets the gold standard: three musicians totally in sync, improvising with an emotional connection so subtle and spontaneous that it redefined the trio format. I've even come to like the background clink of glasses and the murmur of conversation, down in that Greenwich Village basement one Sunday all those years ago.

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Ray Bryant Trio, 1957. Photograph by Esmond Edwards. Hired as a clerk and then photographer for Prestige just months before this photo was taken, Edwards went on to a long and distinguished career as graphic designer, composer, arranger, and producer. He eventually rose to head Verve Records, making him one of the first African-American
executives in the recording industry.

The location portrait
The location portrait has long been a staple of album covers, and not just in jazz. Think of Bob and Suze walking down that street outside their apartment on The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan. There's something intriguing about seeing a famous musician out and about in his neighborhood, as if you might bump into him yourself.

This cover, from Ray's first album as a sole leader, charmed me the moment I first saw it. Edwards' minimalist photo hints at the clean, open sound of the music inside, while Reid Miles, freelancing for Prestige from his main gig at Blue Note, has done his usual stylish job with the layout. And look at Ray. He’s quite the dude here, just 25 years old and on top of the world. By this point he'd already been house pianist at Philadelphia's Blue Note for years, playing with the greats of the day. Over half a century of virtuoso jazz still lay ahead of him.

For all that was to come later, there's a freshness and purity to this one that makes it my favorite. Ray's technique sparkles and he couldn’t stop swinging if he tried. Above all you hear his poise: he can launch into a phrase, take it somewhere fanciful, and then wrap it up so neatly you just have to smile. Anyone who can listen to "Blues Changes" here and not feel better for it is having a really bad day.

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Speak No Evil, Wayne Shorter, 1966. Photograph by Reid Miles. Despite designing hundreds of Blue Note covers, many of which he also photographed, Miles preferred his music classical and had little time for jazz. He relied on session notes from producer Alfred Lion to come up with his designs. 

The miscellaneous
This is my catch-all category for the rest, from cover photos inspired by the album title but unrelated to the artist (for example, Eric Dolphy's Out to Lunch) to composites like Speak No Evil. At least I think it's a composite. Like the music inside, it's an image that works in ways not necessarily open to logical analysis. There's Wayne lurking behind some kind of plant, looking his most sphinx-like. Blurred in the foreground, in best William Klein style, is his wife of the time, Irene Nakagami. The whole thing is toned a deep blue. Jazz album cover designers were big on toning photographs, often strongly and often, for obvious reasons, blue. Sometimes that could feel clichéd, but here it really adds something. Maybe because it's the color of night, somehow it helps prepare you for what you're going to find inside.

And just what is that? Speak No Evil has been called the “dark sister” of Herbie Hancock’s ever-popular Maiden Voyage, recorded about the same time with mostly the same musicians. While Maiden Voyage was the record you gave to a friend to get him interested in jazz, Speak No Evil is an altogether stranger brew. Not that it's a difficult listen, nor lacking in its own mysterious beauty. It's just that Shorter's tenor sax here seems to be operating on an instinctive level that might take some getting used to. He doesn't play many notes but what he wrings out of them is extraordinary. The rest of the band, especially the young Herbie Hancock and the veteran Elvin Jones, is brilliant. But Shorter, impossibly, is even better.

•     •     •

Those are my picks. I'd like to hear yours, even if it means doing a face-slap and saying, why didn't I think of that one? It was a time so rich in both music and photography that there are plenty of favorites to go around for everyone.

John

Bangkok-based photographer John Kennerdell writes two essays a year for TOP. His past contributions can be found under his name in the Categories list in the right-hand sidebar.

©2016 by John Kennerdell, all rights reserved

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(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:

s.wolters: "The Blue Note cover designs stand out by miles. Powerful and pure. The Cover Art of Blue Note Records: The Collection by Graham Marsh is probably the best book to start with. There is a nice book on the covers of Prestige as well, by Geoff Gans. There are two large anniversary books that are beautiful. One on 75 years of Blue Note, called Blue Note: Uncompromising Expression, and one on Verve called Verve: The Sound of America. Both by Richard Havers. There is also a book called Blue Note with only the photographs of Francis Wolff on his work for the label. Another favorite of mine is The Jazz Loft Project: Photographs and Tapes of W. Eugene Smith from 821 Sixth Avenue, 1957-1965. Roy DeCarava’s book The Sound I Saw is also stunning. The two greatest European jazz photographers are Jean Pierre Leloir and of course Ed van der Elsken.

"And finally: last year I surprised a friend with prints I made of downloads of photos from the Library of Congress. There are a lot of jazz musicians in that archive and the resolution and detail is quite good."

phil fogle: "I worked for Donald Silverstein as assistant from 1972–3. I still have a print on my wall that I did in '72 of the Hendrix portrait for Vogue. It's the inside gatefold from Electric Ladyland. Sadly, Hendrix died before I got a chance to meet him. This is the first reference I've seen to Don's work in decades, and it's very moving. Thanks for posting."

Bryce Lee: "33.3 RPM album covers, an era which is no more. The essay made me go over to the record rack (doesn't everybody have one of those?) and pull out all my Dave Brubeck albums and all those by Don Shirley. Brubeck's album covers were may I say, normal for the period. Shirley's however were dark, moody and mysterious, as much as his music. Given the topic, turned on the Dynaco tube amp, placed the disc on the turntable and am now listening to the following: Don Shirley with Two Basses. Released in 1958 on the Cadence Label, have to thank a late friend who willed me in 1990 his entire massive (over 700 albums) record collection of jazz and pipe organ music. My friend was an early adopter of magnetic recording and as a result the discs are almost mint; he would play and record them once, then carefully place them in their sleeves and return them to the rack. They lived on, played on his 15-inch reel Revox or Ampex machines, one after another. The albums remain, most now recorded to CD.

"There is a 'magic' looking at an album cover and listening to the contents, on a turntable with tube amp and a pair of unspoiled original Dynaco A25 speakers. May well spend this Sunday evening listening to a few other discs, sipping a single malt, and watching the amplifier tubes warm the room. Thank you for jogging my aging brain."

Fred Mueller: "Lee Friedlander: American Musicians. My favorite portrait book. He is not a one trick pony."

Kevin Crosado: "It's all a snare and a delusion.... Back in the round black thing era I was moved to buy several John Surman albums largely because I loved Christian Vogt's photos and Dieter Rehm's ECM cover designs. As time has gone on I've become steadily less convinced that this was a Good Thing. (Actually, I quite like bits of his album with Karin Krog—but more for Krog than for Surman's incessant noodling and vamping)."

Mike adds: Yes, sometimes judging (buying) either an album or a book by its cover is a trap, I agree. As for why I think so, lcome this way to my bookshelves and my record racks....  :-\

Comments

[John Camp]

One of the reasons I don't really care for jazz to this day is that a childhood best friend and sometime college roommate was a jazz nut, and in particular, an Ornette Coleman fanatic. He would play Coleman's records incessantly, literally hours on end, and sometimes, the same tune over and over, until he had it fully ingested. I mean, enough was enough. When you brought up this whole jazz album/photography thing (an idea that could support its own website) I could close my eyes and see the cover of an Ornette Coleman album, Ornette and some other guys standing in some woods in the snow. Weird, but interesting. There were quite a few jazz albums with paintings on the cover, as well. I know that because my friend had approximately a million long-play albums, and I used to go through them looking at the art, while (mostly) staying away from the music. I have a dozen or so jazz albums now, mostly of the complication sort. A series of jazz albums came out in the early 2000s with names like "Jazz for a Rainy Day" and "Jazz for When You're Alone" and they featured a kind of throw-back Paris-based jazz photography, that I find kind of interesting.

[John Camp]

I forgot to mention it in my first post, but overtime I wrote out Ornette Coleman's name, the @#$%&* iMac spellchecker changed it to Ornate. And stupidly, would leave the word capitalized in the middle of a sentence.

[Soeren Engelbrecht]

When I shot an album cover some years ago (http://www.imagepro.dk/Nechoes/index.htm), it dawned on me that in the past, we had the 12x12 inch "canvas" of the LP, since reduced to the 5x5 inch format of the CD, and in the future of iTunes and Streaming, the listener will usually see something like 2x2 inches on a screen. That surely has had a significant impact on the way that covers are designed these days. My own preferred format: The 12x24 inch gatefold sleeves of, e.g., Marillion or Genesis.

[Mattias]

There is, of course, a ridiculous amount of great jazz album covers from this period with an emphasis on photography, even though it is often difficult to isolate the quality of the photographs from the quality of the overall design where photographs, typography and and illustrations complement and feed off each other. That cover of "Speak No Evil" is among the great ones. But I have always loved the combination of music and the introspective portraits of Coltrane and Miles on "Blue Train" and "Round About Midnight" respectively. Both seemingly lost in thought or in their music. Both on their way to creating musical legacies that reach into eternity. I strongly feel that black North American music (forgive me if I don't find the politically correct description) such as blues, jazz, soul and rap (all of them emphatically important) is THE great North American gift of cultural expression to the rest of us in other parts of the world.

[Joe Holmes]

Lee Friedlander shot a lot of jazz musicians for album covers in the late 1950s when he first moved to New York. He was the house photographer at Atlantic Records for a time. I'm not having much luck finding a good collection of his jazz shots online, but here's one classic: http://ucdocumentary.blogspot.com/2015/10/lee-friedlander.html

[Stephen Gilbert]

Donald Byrd's A New Perspective?

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/61mB9PNARpL._SL1050_.jpg

[And don't forget Tone-Loc's tribute --Mike]

[Manuel]

Brilliant article, John. Congrats.
Curiously, my favourite Jazz album cover has no photographs: it's Cannonball Adderley's 'Somethin' Else' (Blue Note ST-46338). It might have no photos - which is strange, as Blue Note gained some reputation due to Francis Wolff's photographs -, but Reid Miles' graphic concept was groundbreaking and resisted the test of time. It is great, even by today's standards.
One favourite of mine is Thelonious Monk's 'Monk's Music' (Riverside RLP-242). Paul Weller's photograph is amazing in that it perfectly capures - perhaps not too subtly - Monk's eccentricity. As a counterpoint, the cover for 'Thelonious Himself' (Riverside RLP-235) shows us the introspective side of Thelonious Monk - which is wonderfully appropriate for this splendid, beautiful solo album.
Jazz album covers are so rich and diverse that it's hard to pick one. All Blue Notes of the 60's are excellent. Even Riverside and Prestige, which weren't reputed by the quality of their covers, produced some excellent ones, as the Monk's albums I mentioned and Sonny Rollins' 'Saxophone Colossus' (Prestige P-7079). And then there's Impulse, a label which put some serious effort in their albums' presentation. The three I've mentioned earlier, however, are in my view the most accomplished ones.
And let's not forget some great photographers had a keen interest in Jazz. Lee Friedlander contributed for album covers with some great photographs (the one on Coltrane's 'Giant Steps', one of my favourite Jazz albums, comes to mind), and W. Eugene Smith made some fabulous pictures which feature in his 'The Loft' collection. To mention but a few.
As an aside, my favourite Jazz-themed photograph isn't on an album, nor was it made by some prominent photographer. It's a glorious image of Pannonica de Koenigswarter and Thelonious Monk getting inside Nica's Bentley by the Five Spot. This picture's atmosphere and sheer sophistication fascinated me so much I tried to get to know everything about it. I found its author was photojournalist Ben Martin, about whom little is known. It's one of my favourite pictures, and is the one that spurred me to photograph at night. I don't master HTML, so I can't incorporate it, but here's a link: https://numerofblog.files.wordpress.com/2015/04/thelonious-monk-and-baron-008.jpg

[Roger Overall]

Superb post. What wonderful photographs. Thank you, John.

[Timbray]

Both the cover and inside shot on the wonderful Coltrane/Hartman album are pretty good; used ’em on my blog at https://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/200x/2007/05/14/Coltrane-Hartman

[Richard Jones]

Thanks, John Kennerdell, for the informative article!

My favorite studio portrait is that by acclaimed photographer, Roy DeCarava, of Bill Evan's "Conversations With Myself Album:

The screen shot of the front cover doesn't do the photograph justice: it is not a complete silhouette, rather, some beautiful modeling light across the left side of Bill's face.

It was a very controversial album because of the overdubbing (two overlay tracks on the original)

By one source, Roy DeCarava's favorite jazz musician subject was John Coltrane:

“Coltrane on Soprano, 1963”, captures the performer in his musical element. Coltrane was one of photographer Roy DeCarava’s favorite subjects. “I traveled up and down the East Coast to hear him play and to photograph him. I shot photos in the clubs with the lighting that was available. If I thought I was bothering him, then I wouldn’t shoot. I would just listen to the music.”

A nice obituary/bio of Roy DeCarava

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2010/01/deca-j07.html
"DeCarava was best known for his dark and sublimely textured portraits of American jazz musicians..."

- Richard

[Mark Kinsman]

A few come to mind for me:
Nirvana - Zoot Sims and Bucky Pizzarelli - photographer Thaxton Levine - moody B&W images of the musicians in the studio suggest a late night recording session. The Comprehensive Charlie Parker, Live Performances Vol 1 on ESP-Disk, photographer Alex Marshack's front cover photo has Charlie playing his sax in a kitchen, pots and pans, in the foreground - his eyes suggest he's lost in thought, his hands obscured by a shelf.
But for me, the most impactful covers were from my college days and CTI records- Creed Taylor's label with all the budding jazz players - George Benson, Ron Carter, Herbie Hancock,Freddie Hubbard, etc. Pete Turners photos dominated the covers - all printed in high quality - color, edgy or at least fashion conscious of the times, the one that sticks out the most in my mind is the cover for Stanley Turrentine's Sugar album. Suggestive, sexy, moody and jazzy. Pete did release a book of his work from that time - in an album sized book. Highly recommended to anyone who explored these CTI albums of the 70s.

[Stephen Gilbert]

Mike,

That's just showing off.

Besides, Donald's cover has an early, preferred version of the XKE.

Steve

[Kevin Purcell]

Another vote for Eugene Smith in Sam Stephenson's The Jazz Loft Project book.

Image: Thelonious Monk (with Hal Overton in the background).

Click on the image for an slideshow from the NY Times (with audio from the Jazz Loft tapes).

I think of the Jazz Loft as a very long form of jazz photography (multimedia?) more like "wildlife" photography rather than portraiture or photographing stage performances. It also does its best to reveal some of the odd personality of Eugene Smith.

One thing missing from this book was a CD. It really needed a CD. After all the book is about both the tape recordings and photographs made in Eugene Smith's loft. Once you add the audio you get the full picture of life in the loft.

A close substitute for the CD is WNYC Jazz Loft radio series produced and hosted by Sara Fishko and originally heard as a 10-part radio series in 2009.

http://www.wnyc.org/shows/jazz-loft/

Or as a four part set of podcasts for NPR

http://basementrug.com/downloads/jazz-loft-anthology.zip

This interview with Sam Stephenson, author of the book, is worth a listen too.

http://www.wnyc.org/story/59643-the-jazz-loft-project/

I see Sara Fishko has made a documentary film on this topic too: "The Jazz Loft According to W. Eugene Smith. It debuted at the New Orleans Film Festival in October 2015. I've not seen it yet but perhaps it'll appear on PBS (or Netflix) or at a film festival near me.

http://www.wnyc.org/jazzloftthemovie/
http://www.wnyc.org/story/jazz-loft-wnyc-studios-original/

[David Boyce]

I personally think any conversation about Jazz, Photography and Album Covers has to include a large section on ECM and Manfred Eicher. I have bought ECM records on the cover alone, being that they are often as good as the music inside.

Here is a New York Times article from 2012 that talks about the importance of the image to the music. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/30/arts/design/ecm-album-covers-by-manfred-eicher.html?_r=0

Windfall Light and Horizons Touched are two great publications on ECM and its art.

[Robert Hudyma]

I love Jean Bach's documentary that revolves around Art Kane's Jazz who's who photo: A Great Day in Harlem. I saw the film at the movie theater in San Francisco in 1995 and later on DVD.

Recommended.

[Mike Durling]

A while back I picked up an album called Jazz at Preservation Hall III. It wasn't until I got it home that I realized that on the cover were two extraordinary portraits by Lee Friedlander. I don't think of him as a portraitist, but apparently he made a number of photos of New Orleans jazz musicians back in the '60s.

[mike plews]

I have a soft spot for Pete Turner's portrait of Antonio Carlos Jobim on the cover of Stone Flower.

http://www.amazon.com/Stone-Flower-Antonio-Carlos-Jobim/dp/B0000630CR

Creed Taylor used a lot of Pete Turners pictures on the albums he produced when he ran CTI records.
I think the Jobim picture may be one of the only artist portraits the rest being classic Turner images.
Interesting note, I was just looking at my copy of Prelude by Dedato which came out in the early 1970's. It has a lovely Turner image on the cover. On the inside you will find "Cover photograph available as large (11 in. X 14 in.) custom color print for $19.50 Each photograph is printed by K&L Color Laboratories from the original transparency according to the photographers own standards".

[Alan Carmody]

Tone-Loc, Mike? Truly, your tastes range far and wide. We had no idea.

On a serious note, I too reacted more positively to the mid-Sixties Blue Note cover until I realized why. The graphic style established in that decade has persisted into our times, and so the cover elements are familiar and trigger recognition quickly. The use of saturated blue, the lipstick imprint in red, the blurred foreground face, all these would not be out of place in any design work today.

By contrast, the Fifties covers are more of their time, with that brick/sepia color being strictly from that era and little used today.

Of the three examples from that earlier decade, it is the Ray Bryant cover that seems the most modern.

But they are all masterpieces of the form.

Thank you John for putting them up.

[Dave]

Love these jazz posts. This one might be the best yet. Lots of music to sample and great photos.

[Jean]

Wow, Mike! Thank you and your guest writer, John Kennerdell! You know that we love you, and your combination of photo, your view on the World and everything in it! We newer know what's next, and that is a good thing.

[Sarge]

For the photos, if not the music, my favorite album is: The Last Giant: the John Coltrane anthology, by Rhino Records © 1993. A two-CD album, it has a cloth-bound CD case and a 50-page booklet inside a slipcase. The cover photos of the booklet and the slipcase are by Lee Friedlander.

                    Inside back cover photo by Ray Avery

The booklet of "liner" and biographical notes is richly illustrated with B&W photos of John Coltrane et al taken by various photographers. Full-page photos appear on almost every two-page spread of the booklet.

             'Trane and Diz', New York City, 1951. Photo by Popsie Randolph

             Monterey Jazz Festival, 1962. Photo by Ray Avery

              European Tour, 1961. Photographer unknown

I really like only 6 out of the 19-piece double-album; I like almost all of the photos.

[Sam]

Love that Bill Evans Trio album - on high rotation here ... would also suggest 1961 release Junior Mance Trio At The Village Vanguard (http://www.discogs.com/Junior-Mance-Trio-At-The-Village-Vanguard/release/377179 ) which perversely has rear band photo credit (Steve Shapiro if you don't mind) but cover image credit for design to Ken Deardoff, who designed at least 5 Bill Evans covers for Riverside Records ...

[Tom Kwas]

Jazz seems to attract artists like bears to honey. Let's not forget the great illustration used on jazz covers too, like David Stone Martin and even Andy Warhol, before "pop art" fame.

One of the highlights of my so-called photo life was spending a few vacation days in the mid 90's touring the George Eastman house in Rochester, and then driving back to the mid-west through Chicago and catching a Claxton show and lecture at the Harold Washington library. I bought a high-end, press produced (not photographic) print of Chet Baker, and William Claxton signed it and chatted with me about the jazz guys he had known and/or photographed, including my favorite Jack Teagarden. Nice time, and a truly nice guy.

[Luke]

Boy, you can smell the wretched reek of tobacco in some of those.

Pete Turner did some nice covers for Creed Taylor. Not portraits, but very strong graphics. One of my favorites is a long, curved boat wake on a Bill Evans album.

Here's an interesting interview with Turner:

http://www.jazzwax.com/2008/04/pete-turner-cti.html

[Gary]

Seems odd in an article of this scope to not mention Friedlander. Especially when you reference one of his covers (Coleman's, Shape of Jazz to Come).

[Bob Cook]

Interesting post John - thanks. Regarding your first example, Chet Baker: he's credited with an interesting quote - "it takes a pretty great drummer to be better than no drummer." Wonder how he worked that out in all of the groups he played with. Must have always had great drummers with him.

[Mike Chisholm]

I have to say, when I think "photography and jazz" (or at least "modern jazz-heritage music") I think of ECM. What label has done more to use expressive photography to subtle effect on its sleeves? The sought-after books "Sleeves of Desire" and "Horizons Touched", produced by ECM, shows how seriously they take this aspect of the whole package.

Mike

[Jordan]

I agree with the others that ECM covers are cool. Some of the early Pat Metheny album covers are iconic (Bright Size Life, New Chautaqua). The albums themselves are worth seeking out.

I'd also add that Speak No Evil is a fantastic album. If lasers could wear out CDs, my copy would have turned to a pile of dust by now.

[Andre Y]

Since no one's mentioned Don Hunstein yet, how about Don Hunstein? I came to know his photography from classical music (his photos of Glenn Gould and Leonard Bernstein are probably two his better known work), but since he was the Columbia house photographer, he also photographed Miles Davis and Bob Dylan, among others. Here's his website with some of his work: http://www.donhunstein.com/artists.php

Also, there's a funny moment at around 16:10 of a young Hunstein trying to photograph a petulant Gould: https://youtu.be/g0MZrnuSGGg?t=16m10s

[Robin Dreyer]

I immediately thought of the cover for "Blue Trane". Trane wetting a reed held in his right hand, left hand tucked behind his head, tenor hanging around his neck. An eccentric and beautiful portrait of a beautiful man -- printed deep blue, of course.

And then there's the truly astonishing cover of Thelonius Monk's Underground. I don't know anything about the origin of this image, but holy cow.

[Norm Snyder]

The late Harold Feinstein deserves a mention here. While there are not any of his covers for Blue Note on his site www.haroldfeinstein.com , his work deserves mention [and his site a visit], as he designed and shot some covers for that label. Also of note is the fact that he was the tenant of the jazz loft in NYC of [resurgent] fame, eventually given over to Gene Smith by Harold, reportedly because Harold's wife was pregnant, and there was no bathroom on the floor of the loft. Harold passed on this past fall, and he's missed, as are a lot of the musicians who played at the loft.

In my own work, including the frames from the 60s I've been revisiting recently, compared with more recent work, I note that the cigarette smoke is missing.

[Mahn England]

If Manfred Eicher chooses a photo of mine for an ECM album cover then I will have reached nirvana.

[JK]

Manuel, funny but as I was writing this I kept thinking about that Somethin' Else cover. So simple, so striking, so perfect. If this site were called The Online Typographer I would have devoted the whole piece to Reid Miles and that design.

As for Friedlander, I actually started writing about Giant Steps but decided that neither the photo nor the design were as interesting as those on the Chet Baker cover, even if the music was a lot more significant. And yes, the reference to The Shape of Jazz to Come would have been a perfect place to mention him, except I don't think he took that photo. The album cover credit says Claxton, as do all online authorities I've seen. Evidently it came from the same shoot as the semi-famous B&W portrait here.

Finally, for John C., I'd like to apologize to my college roommate for playing way too much Ornette. He claimed he came to like it but I think he was just being polite.

[Chris Y.]

Oh my god, album covers. A huge visual feast just gone. City to city and town to town, album covers and liner notes WERE the Internet...

[s.wolters]

Did anyone mention Jazzinphoto? You can search on artists and photographer.s Some files are large enough for a decent print.

https://jazzinphoto.wordpress.com