Herbie Hancock | Top Albums

	Maiden Voyage This is an undisputed masterpiece featuring the small group post-bop sound that would set the standard for small jazz combos, including that of Miles Davis. Featuring some of Hancock's strongest compostitions ("Maiden Voyage", "Eye of the Hurrican", "Little One", and "Dolphin Dance") and a group that was at its peak, particularly Freddie Hubbard and tenor saxophonist George Coleman.
	Empyrean Isles Recorded before Maiden Voyage, this less famous album is every bit as good. Using only one horn (Freddie Hubbard playing cornet rather than his usual trumpet) the rhythm section of Hancock, Tony Williams, and Ron Carter is given maximum space to stretch out and interact. The only well known track here is "Cantaloupe Island", but it's all good.
	Takin' Off That anyone could have pulled off a first solo album sounding this mature is truly amazing. Featuring Dexter Gordon on tenor and Freddie Hubbard on trumpet, it packs the punch of other small groups popular at the time, such as Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers or Horace Silver's group.
	Speak Like a Child This is generally thought to be a notch below Hancock's other Blue Note recordings, and maybe so, but that speaks volumes about the quality of his work during this period. In addition, the larger horn section (Thad Jones, flugelhorn/Peter Phillips, bass trombone/Jerry Dodgion, alto flute) sets the stage for Hancock's late '60s/early '70s experiements with the Mwandishi group.
	The Prisoner Working with a still larger group (a nonet), Hancock demonstrates his abilities as an orchestrator and arranger as well as a composer. This is a suite of music loosely inspired by Martin Luther King's struggle for civil rights. Includes some inspired performances by Johnny Coles and Joe Henderson.
	Sextant The last of the albums by Hancock's Mwandishi sextet (the others are collected on the Complete Warner Recordings below) finds Hancock along with trombonist Julian Priester, trumpeter Eddie Henderson, and woodwind player Bennie Maupin (who contributed to Hancock's own Headhunters as well as Miles' Bitches Brew) incorporating free jazz with electronic sounds in a very organic way. This is one of the best fusion albums ever, recorded before the term was even coined.
	Headhunters Get down and shake your booty. The first of Hancock's really populist albums that created his musical split personality. Judged as a fusion album, it's classic, as a jazz album it's...well, not really jazz. As a modern popular music album, it's a really great listen and demonstrates that dance music, funk, electronics, and improvised music can all exist peacefully together.
	V.S.O.P. Sophisticated, acoustic, small group jazz that demonstrated that there was still plenty of life in the Miles Davis quintet concept. That group, with trumpeter Freddie Hubbard instead of Miles, creates wonderfully inventive music that is everything a small jazz group should be. Hancock demonstrated that he wasn't ready to leave the jazz world behind (as his former boss Miles had done) just yet.
	Future Shock Yeah, yeah, not all that great an album, you say. Well, if you're looking at it from a 1969 perspective, maybe not. But taken on its own terms it provided a shot in the arm to both Hancock's career and the forthcoming electronic music movement. It reeks of the 1980s, but there's plenty of intelligent and excellent work here, from Bill Laswell's crisp production to Pete Cosey's guitar work to Sly Dunbar's beats. This album demonstrated clearly that Hancock was trying to meld some things together in a new way, not merely reaching for a mass audience.
	The New Standard A good idea, well exectued. Take some fairly recent pop music material and reharmonize it and perform it as thought it were a jazz standard. Thus, we get songs like "New York Minute", "Mercy Street", "Thieves in the Temple" and "Scarborough Fair" rendered lovingly and intersetingly by Hancock, Jack DeJohnette, John Scofield, Dave Holland, Michael Brecker, and Don Alias.
	Directions In Music Not, strictly speaking, a Hancock album, this live tribute to Miles Davis and John Coltrane by Herbie, Michael Brecker and Roy Hargrove revisits some standard tunes and includes originals, all seeking to further investigate the music of these two jazz giants. One of the better tribute recordings to either of these jazz greats available.
Box Sets
	Mwandishi: The Complete Warner Brothers Recordings Features the albums "Fat Albert Rotunda", "Mwandishi", and "Crossings" in their entirety. "Fat Albert" is funky large group material that is a bit of an anomaly in the Hancock catalog, but the other two recordings are wonderful, exploring the place where post-bop abstract jazz and the free improvising avant-garde might meet.
	The Complete Blue Note Sixties Sessions Since all but one of the Hancock Blue Note albums is included in his "best" above, you can bet that this box set gives you value for your money.
	The Herbie Hancock Box Collection of Hancock's work for Columbia Records, from the last recording of his Mwandishi band, through the Headhunters years, V.S.O.P., and his techno work with Bill Laswell.