Joe Henderson Essentials

In the '60s, this tenor saxophonist put his clean tone and fertile imagination to work playing several of the era's most compelling swing styles. Bop-influenced albums like 1963's Page One feature Henderson's talent for lyrical improvisation and straight-ahead composition, as on the bossa-nova hook of “Recordame (Remember Me)”; later, he explored more fiery textures on albums like Inner Urge. By the time of his recordings for the Milestone label, he was mixing these stylistic inputs with abandon: 1971's Joe Henderson Live in Japan resulted in funk-tinged hard bop.