Collection: Kenny Burrell

Kenny Burrell grew up in Detroit in a musical family, started guitar at twelve under the influence of Charlie Christian and Django Reinhardt, and by seventeen was playing professional gigs around the city alongside future giants Tommy Flanagan, Paul Chambers, Pepper Adams, and Elvin Jones. He made his recording debut in 1951 in a Dizzy Gillespie sextet session that also featured John Coltrane and Milt Jackson, graduated from Wayne State University with a degree in music composition in 1955, and moved to New York the following year after a touring stint with Oscar Peterson's trio. Blue Note signed him immediately, and the series of albums he recorded for the label through the late 1950s established a guitar voice that sat precisely where bebop and the blues intersect: warm-toned, unhurried, harmonically sophisticated, and always rooted in feeling. "Midnight Blue" (Blue Note, 1963), recorded with Stanley Turrentine on tenor and Ray Barretto on congas, is the record most collectors reach for first, and it remains one of the label's best-loved soul jazz albums. "Guitar Forms" (Verve, 1964), arranged for him by Gil Evans, is the other essential stop, demonstrating a range that extended well beyond the organ trio and small group settings he is most associated with. His Prestige and CTI work, including the 1958 meeting with John Coltrane released on New Jazz, fills out a catalogue that rewards collector attention across multiple labels and eras.