6 albums as leader and 13 as sideman (1968–2018), each listed chronologically.
1971 · Beyond the Blue Horizon
Before Breezin' (1976), George Benson was known strictly as a working jazz guitarist, the kind who turns up on sideman dates like Straight Life (1970). Breezin' then became one of the best-selling jazz albums ever, and its single 'This Masquerade' won the Grammy for Record of the Year — overnight, the sideman guitarist became a pop-charting vocalist.
1976 · Breezin'
"This Masquerade" from 1976's Breezin' won Record of the Year at the 19th Annual Grammy Awards. The album itself won Best Pop Instrumental Performance for Benson
1973 · Body Talk
Frank Foster joined Count Basie's saxophone section in 1953, and he also wrote for the band; his 1955 chart "Shiny Stockings" stayed in the book for decades. The tenor player sitting in the section on April In Paris (1957) and Count Basie At Newport (1957) ended up leading the orchestra himself in 1986, two years after Basie died.
1989 · Tenderly
By 1989 George Benson was known for pop and R&B hits, but Tenderly was an acoustic standards date. The drum chair went to Louis Hayes, a hard bop drummer who had been working the same way since the late 1950s.
1970 · Straight Life
The bass intro that defines Freddie Hubbard's Red Clay (1970) wasn't Hubbard's — bassist Ron Carter invented it on the spot because Freddie never brought the part. "Luckily, the right note hit at the right time," Carter said. The hook that became the song's signature was an improvisation forced by a missing chart.
— Statement stmt-ron-carter-on-freddie-hubbard
1981 · Silk
Amandla (1989) carries Miles Davis's name, but Marcus Miller wrote most of it, produced it, and overdubbed keyboards and bass clarinet alongside his own bass. The man who had been the band's bassist a few years earlier was now designing the sound itself.
Freddie Hubbard
Ron Carter
Marcus Miller