Just got news that Hank Jones died. Came as a surprise given how vital and productive he's been the last few years, but it is something 91-year-olds are prone to. Within the last year Jones won a Grammy Lifetime Achievement award and was elected to Downbeat's Hall of Fame -- recognitions he should have earned long ago, but everyone assumed he'd be around forever.

Looking through my database, I can especially recommend the following:

• The Hank Jones Quartet-Quintet (1955, Savoy)
• The Hank Jones Quartet (1956, Savoy)
• Hank (1976, All Art)
• The Oracle (1989, Emarcy)
• Upon Reflection: The Music of Thad Jones (1993, Verve)
• w/Charlie Haden: Steal Away: Spirituals, Hymns and Folk Songs (1995, Verve)
• w/Joe Lovano: Kids: Duets Live at Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola (2006, Blue Note)

I'm not a big piano fan, so a lot of fine records fell just short of my list, including 2005's trio For My Father and last year's Oliver Jones duets, Pleased to Meet You. I've also missed half or more of his records, including all but one of the records he cut as The Great Jazz Trio, and his well-regarded duets with Tommy Flanagan, Our Delights.

AMG has 13 pages of credits for Jones, the more recent entries getting swamped in hard-to-place compilations. Quickly scanning through the list, the following caught my eye (all A- or better in my database):

• Charlie Parker: Charlie Parker (1947-53, Verve)
• Thad Jones: The Fabulous Thad Jones (1954, Debut)
• Kenny Clarke: Bohemia After Dark (1955, Savoy)
• Ben Webster: Music for Loving (1954-55, Verve)
• Jimmy Rushing: Cat Meets Chick/The Jazz Odyssey of James Rushing Esq. (1955-56, Collectables)
• Lucky Thompson: Tricotism (1956, Impulse)
• Coleman Hawkins: The Hawk Flies High (1957, Riverside)
• Cannonball Adderley: Somethin' Else (1958, Blue Note)
• Roland Kirk: We Free Kings (1961, Mercury)
• Ben Webster/Harry Eddison: Ben and Sweets (1962, Columbia)
• Sonny Stitt/Paul Gonsalves: Salt and Pepper (1963, Impulse)
• Ben Webster: See You at the Fair (1964, Impulse)
• Lucky Thompson: Lucky Strikes (1965, Prestige)
• Jimmy Rushing: Every Day I Have the Blues (1967, Impulse)
• Johnny Hodges: Triple Play (1967, Impulse)
• Gene Ammons: Fine and Mellow (1972, Prestige)

I no doubt missed some, plus I noticed some I haven't heard but had long wanted to, like the Helen Merrill-Clifford Brown set. Some notable musicians on Jones' credits list that I didn't map to any of the above records: Louis Armstrong, Chet Baker, Clifford Brown, Ruth Brown, Benny Carter, Nat King Cole, Chris Connor, Miles Davis, Kenny Dorham, Roy Eldridge, Duke Ellington, Tal Farlow, Art Farmer, Ella Fitzgerald, Stan Getz, Dizzy Gillespie, Benny Goodman, Dexter Gordon, Gigi Gryce, Billie Holiday, Milt Jackson, Illinois Jacquet, J.J. Johnson, Elvin Jones, Louis Jordan, John Kirby, Abbey Lincoln, Johnny Mathis, Howard McGhee, Helen Merrill, Charles Mingus, Wes Montgomery, Lee Morgan, Gerry Mulligan, Fats Navarro, Joe Newman, Red Norvo, Anita O'Day, Hot Lips Page, Art Pepper, Houston Person, Flip Phillips, Emily Remler, Artie Shaw, Zoot Sims, Clark Terry, Grover Washington, Joe Wilder, Joe Williams, Lester Young.

Early on he played with practically everyone, and invariably made them better. That the side credits thin out in the 1970s may have had more to do with the sales slump and decentralization than with focusing on his own albums, which in many ways peaked with his early 1990s albums on Verve. He was as central as anyone to jazz history after WWII.