Breezin'

George Benson was already everyone's favorite jazz-funk guitarist by 1976, when Breezin' made him a pop star too. His Stevie Wonder-inspired vocal rendition of Leon Russell's "This Masquerade" proved irresistible, and Breezin' became the first album by a jazz artist to go platinum, topping pop, jazz, and R&B charts simultaneously. From the Bobby Womack-penned title track to Jose Feliciano's "Affirmation," Breezin' glides by on Benson's fleet-fingered fluidity, low-key funk, and a string section that adds just enough sugar to this tasty concoction.