Hank Mobley

Hank Mobley's tenor saxophone had a round, warm, relaxed sound, neither as heavy as John Coltrane's nor as light as Lester Young's, which is why critic Leonard Feather famously called him 'the middleweight champion of the tenor saxophone'.

He played in the first Jazz Messengers with Art Blakey and Horace Silver and briefly in Miles Davis's quintet, but his best work came on Blue Note as a leader. Soul Station, with Wynton Kelly, Paul Chambers and Blakey, is hard bop at its most melodic, and Roll Call, Workout and No Room for Squares keep the standard high, his lines always swinging and beautifully constructed.