Below are five classic jazz songs about lost love. Hang in there! There are plenty of fish in the sea! Let some jazz legends soothe you while you get used to being single for a while.
Make sure to also read my Valentine's Day List of Jazz Love Songs, and my Valentine's Day List of Depressing Jazz Songs.
1. ‘When Your Lover Has Gone’ - Ben Webster and Oscar Peterson
Courtesy of Verve Records
From their 1959 album Ben Webster Meets Oscar Peterson, the duo is joined by bassist Ray Brown and drummer Ed Thigpen. Webster’s tone wavers and breaks the way a human voice might if it were the voice of someone who had just been dumped.
2. ‘It’s Easy to Remember (But So Hard to Forget)’ - John Coltrane
Courtesy of Verve Records
In 1962 John Coltrane and his classic quartet, featuring drummer Elvin Jones, pianist McCoy Tyner, and bassist Jimmy Garrison put a damper on their intense jams and showed their sensitive sides with the album Ballads. Coltrane wrote the book on how to play a ballad with this album.
3. ‘Body and Soul’ - Billie Holiday
Courtesy of Verve Records
This well-known lament can’t be made any sadder than the way Billie Holiday sang it. It is on her 1957 album Body and Soul.
4. ‘You Don’t Know What Love Is’ - Sonny Rollins
Courtesy of Original Jazz Classics
Sonny Rollins brings his usual quirky charm to this otherwise brooding ballad on his renowned Saxophone Collosus from 1956.
5. ‘My Man’s Gone Now’ - Bill Evans
Courtesy of Ojc
This haunting version of the George Gershwin tune from the show Porgy and Bess was recorded in 1961 on Bill Evans’ masterpiece live album, Sunday at the Village Vanguard.