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The 100 Best Jazz Songs Of All Time

A man holds and playing a saxophone in a red room.
KNKX

Thousands of Jazz24 listeners voted for the songs they felt were the 100 best jazz songs of all time.

If there was one theme we noticed while sorting through the 1,500 nominations, it was that time does not take its toll on great music. "Take Five," which was the first jazz single to sell 1 million copies, was the undisputed top choice, while Miles Davis' "So What" (which was coincidentally recorded in the same year, 1959) was the clear second favorite.

With a few exceptions, it appeared that when listeners looked to jazz vocalists, they preferred female artists that tugged at the heartstrings, while in most cases those who preferred instrumentalists enjoyed swinging, memorable mid- to up-tempo hits.

In large part, voters also seemed to focus on songs from the one or two most popular albums of a particular artist. That is, with the exception of John Coltrane. Coltrane fans still seem very divided on what qualifies as his best work, and the diversity of his catalog is evident in this list.

Thanks to one of our listeners, you can also listen to the entire Jazz 100 as a Spotify playlist below.