Miles Davis
Encyclopedia
Miles Dewey Davis III was an American jazz
musician, trumpeter, bandleader
, and composer. Widely considered one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century, Miles Davis was, with his musical groups, at the forefront of several major developments in jazz music, including bebop
, cool jazz
, hard bop
, modal jazz
, and jazz fusion
.
On October 7, 2008, his 1959 album Kind of Blue
received its fourth platinum
certification from the Recording Industry Association of America
(RIAA), for shipments of at least four million copies in the United States. Miles Davis was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
in 2006. Davis was noted as "one of the key figures in the history of jazz".
On November 5, 2009, Rep. John Conyers
of Michigan sponsored a measure in the US House of Representatives to recognize and commemorate the album Kind of Blue
on its 50th anniversary. The measure also affirms jazz
as a national treasure and "encourages the United States government to preserve and advance the art form of jazz music." It passed, unanimously, with a vote of 409–0 on December 15, 2009.
, Illinois. His father, Dr. Miles Henry Davis
, was a dentist. In 1927 the family moved to East St. Louis, Illinois
. They also owned a substantial ranch in northern Arkansas
, where Davis learned to ride horses as a boy.
Davis' mother, Cleota Mae (Henry) Davis, wanted her son to learn the piano; she was a capable blues pianist but kept this fact hidden from her son. His musical studies began at 13, when his father gave him a trumpet and arranged lessons with local musician Elwood Buchanan
. Davis later suggested that his father's instrument choice was made largely to irk his wife, who disliked the trumpet's sound. Against the fashion of the time, Buchanan stressed the importance of playing without vibrato
; he was reported to have slapped Davis' knuckles every time he started using heavy vibrato
. Davis would carry his clear signature tone throughout his career. He once remarked on its importance to him, saying, "I prefer a round sound with no attitude in it, like a round voice with not too much tremolo
and not too much bass. Just right in the middle. If I can’t get that sound I can’t play anything." Clark Terry
was another important early influence.
By age 16, Davis was a member of the music society and playing professionally when not at school. At 17, he spent a year playing in Eddie Randle's band, the Blue Devils. During this time, Sonny Stitt
tried to persuade him to join the Tiny Bradshaw band, then passing through town, but Davis' mother insisted that he finish his final year of high school.
In 1944, the Billy Eckstine
band visited East St. Louis. Dizzy Gillespie
and Charlie Parker
were members of the band, and Davis was brought in on third trumpet for a couple of weeks because the regular player, Buddy Anderson, was out sick. Even after this experience, once Eckstine's band left town, Davis' parents were still keen for him to continue formal academic studies.
of Music.
Upon arriving in New York, he spent most of his first weeks in town trying to get in contact with Charlie Parker
, despite being advised against doing so by several people he met during his quest, including saxophonist
Coleman Hawkins
.
Finally locating his idol, Davis became one of the cadre of musicians who held nightly jam session
s at two of Harlem
's nightclubs, Minton's Playhouse
and Monroe's. The group included many of the future leaders of the bebop
revolution: young players such as Fats Navarro
, Freddie Webster
, and J. J. Johnson. Established musicians including Thelonious Monk
and Kenny Clarke
were also regular participants.
Davis dropped out of Juilliard, after asking permission from his father. In his autobiography, Davis criticized the Juilliard classes for centering too much on the classical European and "white" repertoire. However, he also acknowledged that Juilliard helped give him a grounding in music theory that would prove valuable in later years.
Davis began playing professionally, performing in several 52nd Street clubs with Coleman Hawkins and Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis. In 1945, he entered a recording studio for the first time, as a member of Herbie Fields
's group. This was the first of many recordings to which Davis contributed in this period, mostly as a sideman
. He finally got the chance to record as a leader in 1946, with an occasional group called the Miles Davis Sextet plus Earl Coleman and Ann Hathaway—one of the rare occasions when Davis, by then a member of the groundbreaking Charlie Parker Quintet, can be heard accompanying singers. In these early years, recording sessions where Davis was the leader were the exception rather than the rule; his next date as leader would not come until 1947.
Around 1945, Dizzy Gillespie
parted ways with Parker, and Davis was hired as Gillespie's replacement in his quintet, which also featured Max Roach
on drums, Al Haig
(replaced later by Sir Charles Thompson and Duke Jordan
) on piano, and Curley Russell
(later replaced by Tommy Potter
and Leonard Gaskin
) on bass.
With Parker's quintet, Davis went into the studio several times, already showing hints of the style for which he would become known. On an oft-quoted take of Parker's signature song, "Now's the Time", Davis takes a melodic solo, whose unbop-like quality anticipates the "cool jazz
" period that would follow. The Parker quintet also toured widely. During a stop in Los Angeles, Parker had a nervous breakdown
that landed him in the Camarillo State Mental Hospital
for several months, and Davis found himself stranded. He roomed and collaborated for some time with bassist Charles Mingus
, before getting a job on Billy Eckstine
's California tour, which eventually brought him back to New York. In 1948, Parker returned to New York, and Davis rejoined his group.
The relationships within the quintet, however, were growing tense. Parker's erratic behavior (attributable to his well-known drug addiction) and artistic choices (both Davis and Roach objected to having Duke Jordan as a pianist and would have preferred Bud Powell
) became sources of friction. In December 1948, disputes over money (Davis claims he was not being paid) began to strain their relationship even further. Davis finally left the group following a confrontation with Parker at the Royal Roost.
For Davis, his departure from Parker's group marked the beginning of a period in which he worked mainly as a freelancer and as a sideman in some of the most important combos on the New York jazz scene.
. Evans' basement apartment had become the meeting place for several young musicians and composers (including Davis, Roach, pianist John Lewis
, and baritone sax player Gerry Mulligan
) unhappy with the increasingly virtuoso instrumental techniques that dominated the bebop scene of the time. Evans had been the arranger for the Claude Thornhill
orchestra, and it was the sound of this group, as well as Duke Ellington
's example, that suggested the creation of an unusual line-up: a nonet
including a French horn and a tuba
(this accounts for the "tuba band" moniker that was to be associated with the combo).
Davis took an active role in the project, so much so that it soon became "his project". The objective was to achieve a sound similar to the human voice, through carefully arranged compositions and by emphasizing a relaxed, melodic approach to the improvisations.
The nonet debuted in the summer of 1948, with a two-week engagement at the Royal Roost. The sign announcing the performance gave a surprising prominence to the role of the arrangers: "Miles Davis Nonet. Arrangements by Gil Evans
, John Lewis and Gerry Mulligan
". It was, in fact, so unusual that Davis had to persuade the Roost's manager, Ralph Watkins, to allow the sign to be worded in this way; he prevailed only with the help of Monte Kay
, the club's artistic director.
The nonet was active until the end of 1949, along the way undergoing several changes in personnel: Roach and Davis were constantly featured, along with Mulligan, tuba player Bill Barber
, and alto saxophonist Lee Konitz
, who had been preferred to Sonny Stitt
(whose playing was considered too bop-oriented). Over the months, John Lewis alternated with Al Haig on piano, Mike Zwerin
with Kai Winding
on trombone (Johnson was touring at the time), Junior Collins
with Sandy Siegelstein and Gunther Schuller
on French horn, and Al McKibbon
with Joe Shulman
on bass. Singer Kenny Hagood
was added for one track during the recording
The presence of white musicians in the group angered some black jazz players, many of whom were unemployed at the time, but Davis rebuffed their criticisms.
A contract with Capitol Records
granted the nonet several recording sessions between January 1949 and April 1950. The material they recorded was released in 1956 on an album whose title, Birth of the Cool
, gave its name to the "cool jazz
" movement that developed at the same time and partly shared the musical direction begun by Davis' group.
For his part, Davis was fully aware of the importance of the project, which he pursued to the point of turning down a job with Duke Ellington
's orchestra.
The importance of the nonet experience would become clear to critics and the larger public only in later years, but, at least commercially, the nonet was not a success. The liner notes
of the first recordings of the Davis Quintet for Columbia Records
call it one of the most spectacular failures of the jazz club scene. This was bitterly noted by Davis, who claimed the invention of the cool style and resented the success that was later enjoyed—in large part because of the media's attention—by white "cool jazz" musicians (Mulligan and Dave Brubeck
in particular).
This experience also marked the beginning of the lifelong friendship between Davis and Gil Evans, an alliance that would bear important results in the years to follow.
, Kenny Clarke
(who remained in Europe after the tour), and James Moody
. Davis was fascinated by Paris and its cultural environment, where black jazz musicians, and African Americans in general, often felt better respected than they did in their homeland. While in Paris, Davis began a relationship with French actress and singer Juliette Gréco
.
Many of his new and old friends (Davis, in his autobiography, mentions Clarke) tried to persuade him to stay in France, but Davis decided to return to New York. Back in the States, he began to feel deeply depressed. The depression was due in part to his separation from Gréco, in part to his feeling underappreciated by the critics (who were hailing Davis' former collaborators as leaders of the cool jazz movement), and in part to the unraveling of his liaison with a former St. Louis schoolmate who was living with him in New York and with whom he had two children.
These are the factors to which Davis traces a heroin habit that deeply affected him for the next four years. Though Davis denies it in his autobiography, it is also likely that the environment in which he was living played a role. Most of Davis' associates at the time, some of them perhaps in imitation of Charlie Parker, had drug addictions of their own (among them, sax players Sonny Rollins
and Dexter Gordon
, trumpeters Fats Navarro
and Freddie Webster
, and drummer Art Blakey
). For the next four years, Davis supported his habit partly with his music and partly by living the life of a hustler. By 1953, his drug addiction was beginning to impair his ability to perform. Heroin had killed some of his friends (Navarro and Freddie Webster). He himself had been arrested for drug possession while on tour in Los Angeles, and his drug habit had been made public in a devastating interview that Cab Calloway
gave to Down Beat.
Realizing his precarious condition, Davis tried several times to end his drug addiction, finally succeeding in 1954 after returning to his father's home in St. Louis for several months and literally locking himself in a room until he had gone through a painful withdrawal. During this period he avoided New York and played mostly in Detroit and other midwestern towns, where drugs were then harder to come by. A widely-related story, attributed to Richard (Prophet) Jennings was that Davis, while in Detroit playing at the Blue Bird club as a guest soloist in Billy Mitchell
's house band along with Tommy Flanagan
, Elvin Jones
, Betty Carter
, Yusef Lateef
, Barry Harris
, Thad Jones
, Curtis Fuller
and Donald Byrd
stumbled into Baker's Keyboard Lounge
out of the rain, soaking wet and carrying his trumpet in a paper bag under his coat, walked to the bandstand and interrupted Max Roach
and Clifford Brown
in the midst of performing Sweet Georgia Brown
by beginning to play My Funny Valentine
, and then, after finishing the song, stumbled back into the rainy night. Davis was supposedly embarrassed into getting clean by this incident. In his autobiography, Davis disputed this account, stating that Roach had requested that Davis play with him that night, and that the details of the incident, such as carrying his horn in a paper bag and interrupting Roach and Brown, were fictional and that his decision to quit heroin was unrelated to the incident.
Despite all the personal turmoil, the 1950–54 period was actually quite fruitful for Davis artistically. He made quite a number of recordings and had several collaborations with other important musicians. He got to know the music of Chicago pianist Ahmad Jamal
, whose elegant approach and use of space influenced him deeply. He also definitively severed his stylistic ties with bebop.
In 1951, Davis met Bob Weinstock
, the owner of Prestige Records
, and signed a contract with the label. Between 1951 and 1954, he released many records on Prestige, with several different combos. While the personnel of the recordings varied, the lineup often featured Sonny Rollins
and Art Blakey
. Davis was particularly fond of Rollins and tried several times, in the years that preceded his meeting with John Coltrane
, to recruit him for a regular group. He never succeeded, however, mostly because Rollins was prone to make himself unavailable for months at a time. In spite of the casual occasions that generated these recordings, their quality is almost always quite high, and they document the evolution of Davis' style and sound. During this time he began using the Harmon mute, held close to the microphone
, in a way that grew to be his signature, and his phrasing, especially in ballad
s, became spacious, melodic, and relaxed. This sound was to become so characteristic that the use of the Harmon mute by any jazz trumpet player since immediately conjures up Miles Davis.
The most important Prestige recordings of this period (Dig
, Blue Haze
, Bags' Groove
, Miles Davis and the Modern Jazz Giants, and Walkin'
) originated mostly from recording sessions in 1951 and 1954, after Davis' recovery from his addiction. Also of importance are his five Blue Note
recordings, collected in the Miles Davis Volume 1
album.
With these recordings, Davis assumed a central position in what is known as hard bop
. In contrast with bebop, hard bop used slower tempos and a less radical approach to harmony and melody, often adopting popular tunes and standards from the American songbook as starting points for improvisation. Hard bop also distanced itself from cool jazz by virtue of a harder beat and by its constant reference to the blues
, both in its traditional form and in the form made popular by rhythm and blues
. A few critics go as far as to call Walkin the album that created hard bop, but the point is debatable, given the number of musicians who were working along similar lines at the same time (and of course many of them recorded or played with Davis).
Also in this period Davis gained a reputation for being distant, cold, and withdrawn and for having a quick temper. Among the several factors that contributed to this reputation were his contempt for the critics and specialized press and some well-publicized confrontations with the public and with fellow musicians. (One occasion, in which he had a near fight with Thelonious Monk
during the recording of Bags' Groove, received wide exposure in the specialized press.)
The "nocturnal" quality of Davis' playing and his somber reputation, along with his whispering voice, earned him the lasting moniker of "prince of darkness", adding a patina of mystery to his public persona.
, where his performance (and especially his solo on "'Round Midnight
") was greatly admired and prompted the critics to hail the "return of Miles Davis". At the same time, Davis recruited the players for a formation that became known as his "first great quintet": John Coltrane
on tenor saxophone, Red Garland
on piano, Paul Chambers
on bass, and Philly Joe Jones
on drums.
None of these musicians, with the exception of Davis, had received a great deal of exposure before that time; Chambers, in particular, was very young (19 at the time), a Detroit player who had been on the New York scene for only about a year, working with the bands of Bennie Green
, Paul Quinichette
, George Wallington
, J. J. Johnson, and Kai Winding
. Coltrane was little known at the time, in spite of earlier collaborations with Dizzy Gillespie
, Earl Bostic
, and Johnny Hodges
. Davis hired Coltrane as a replacement for Sonny Rollins, after unsuccessfully trying to recruit alto saxophonist Julian "Cannonball" Adderley.
The repertoire included many bebop mainstays, standards
from the Great American Songbook
and the pre-bop era, and some traditional tunes. The prevailing style of the group was a development of the Davis experience in the previous years—Davis playing long, legato
, and essentially melodic lines, while Coltrane, who during these years emerged as a leading figure on the musical scene, contrasted by playing high-energy solos.
With the new formation also came a new recording contract. In Newport
, Davis had met Columbia Records
producer George Avakian
, who persuaded him to sign with his label. The quintet made its debut on record with the extremely well received 'Round About Midnight
. Before leaving Prestige, however, Davis had to fulfill his obligations during two days of recording sessions in 1956. Prestige released these recordings in the following years as four albums: Relaxin' with the Miles Davis Quintet
, Steamin' with the Miles Davis Quintet
, Workin' with the Miles Davis Quintet
, and Cookin' with the Miles Davis Quintet
. While the recording took place in a studio, each record of this series has the structure and feel of a live performance, with several first takes on each album. The records became almost instant classics and were instrumental in establishing Davis' quintet as one of the best on the jazz scene.
The quintet was disbanded for the first time in 1957, following a series of personal problems that Davis blames on the drug addiction of the other musicians. Davis played some gigs at the Cafe Bohemia with a short-lived formation that included Sonny Rollins and drummer Art Taylor
, and then traveled to France, where he recorded the score to Louis Malle
's film Ascenseur pour l'échafaud
. With the aid of French session musicians Barney Wilen
, Pierre Michelot
, and René Urtreger
, and American drummer Kenny Clarke
, he recorded the entire soundtrack with an innovative procedure, without relying on written material: starting from sparse indication of the harmony and a general feel of a given piece, the group played by watching the movie on a screen in front of them and improvising.
Returning to New York in 1958, Davis successfully recruited Cannonball Adderley for his standing group. Coltrane, who in the meantime had freed himself from his drug habits, was available after a highly fruitful experience with Thelonious Monk and was hired back, as was Philly Joe Jones. With the quintet re-formed as a sextet, Davis recorded Milestones, an album anticipating the new directions he was preparing to give to his music.
Almost immediately after the recording of Milestones, Davis fired Garland and, shortly afterward, Jones, again for behavioral problems; he replaced them with Bill Evans
——a young white pianist with a strong classical background——and drummer Jimmy Cobb
. With this revamped formation, Davis began a year during which the sextet performed and toured extensively and produced a record (1958 Miles, also known as 58 Sessions). Evans had a unique, impressionistic approach to the piano, and his musical ideas had a strong influence on Davis. But after only eight months on the road with the group, he was burned out and left. He was soon replaced by Wynton Kelly
, a player who brought to the sextet a swinging
, bluesy approach that contrasted with Evans' more delicate playing.
, often playing flugelhorn
as well as trumpet. The first, Miles Ahead
(1957), showcased his playing with a jazz big band
and a horn section arranged by Evans. Songs included Dave Brubeck
's "The Duke," as well as Léo Delibes
's "The Maids of Cadiz," the first piece of European classical music Davis had recorded. Another distinctive feature of the album was the orchestral passages that Evans had devised as transitions between the different tracks, which were joined together with the innovative use of editing
in the post-production phase, turning each side of the album into a seamless piece of music.
In 1958, Davis and Evans were back in the studio to record Porgy and Bess
, an arrangement of pieces from George Gershwin
's opera of the same name
. The lineup included three members of the sextet: Paul Chambers, Philly Joe Jones, and Julian "Cannonball" Adderley. Davis called the album one of his favorites.
Sketches of Spain
(1959–1960) featured songs by contemporary Spanish composer Joaquin Rodrigo
and also Manuel de Falla
, as well as Gil Evans originals with a Spanish flavor. Miles Davis at Carnegie Hall (1961) includes Rodrigo's Concierto de Aranjuez
, along with other compositions recorded in concert with an orchestra under Evans' direction.
Sessions with Davis and Evans in 1962 resulted in the album Quiet Nights
, a short collection of bossa nova
s that was released against the wishes of both artists: Evans stated it was only half an album, and blamed the record company; Davis blamed producer Teo Macero, whom he didn't speak to for more than two years. This was the last time Evans and Davis made a full album together; despite the professional separation, however, Davis noted later that "my best friend is Gil Evans."
, Kind of Blue
. He called back Bill Evans, months away from forming what would become his own seminal trio, for the album sessions, as the music had been planned around Evans' piano style. Both Davis and Evans were personally acquainted with the ideas of pianist George Russell regarding modal jazz
, Davis from discussions with Russell and others before the Birth of the Cool
sessions, and Evans from study with Russell in 1956. Davis, however, had neglected to inform current pianist Kelly of Evans' role in the recordings; Kelly subsequently played only on the track "Freddie Freeloader
" and was not present at the April dates for the album. "So What" and "All Blues
" had been played by the sextet at performances prior to the recording sessions, but for the other three compositions, Davis and Evans prepared skeletal harmonic frameworks that the other musicians saw for the first time on the day of recording, to allow a fresher approach to their improvisation
s. The resulting album has proven to be both highly popular and enormously influential. According to the RIAA, Kind of Blue is the best-selling jazz album of all time, having been certified as quadruple platinum (4 million copies sold). In December 2009, the US House of Representatives voted 409–0 to pass a resolution honoring the album as a national treasure.
The trumpet Davis used on the recording is currently displayed in the music building on the campus of the University of North Carolina at Greensboro
. It was donated to the school by Arthur "Buddy" Gist, who met Davis in 1949 and became a close friend. The gift was the reason why the jazz program at UNCG is named the "Miles Davis Jazz Studies Program."
In 1959, the Miles Davis Quintet
was appearing at the famous Birdland
nightclub in New York City. After finishing a 27 minute recording for the armed services
, Davis took a break outside the club. As he was escorting an attractive blonde woman across the sidewalk to a taxi, Davis was told by Patrolman Gerald Kilduff to "move on." Davis explained that he worked at the nightclub and refused to move. The officer said that he would arrest Davis and grabbed him as Davis protected himself. Witnesses said that Kilduff punched Davis in the stomach with his nightstick without provocation. Two nearby detectives held the crowd back as a third detective, Don Rolker, approached Davis from behind and beat him about the head. Davis was then arrested and taken to jail where he was charged with feloniously assaulting an officer. He was then taken to St. Clary Hospital where he received five stitches for a wound on his head. Davis attempted to pursue the case in the courts, before eventually dropping the proceedings in a plea bargain
in order to recover his suspended Cabaret Card, enabling him to return to work in New York clubs.
Davis persuaded Coltrane to play with the group on one final European tour in the spring of 1960. Coltrane then departed to form his classic quartet, although he returned for some of the tracks on Davis' 1961 album Someday My Prince Will Come. After Coltrane, Davis tried various saxophonists, including Jimmy Heath
, Sonny Stitt
, and Hank Mobley
. The quintet with Hank Mobley was recorded in the studio and on several live engagements at Carnegie Hall
and the Black Hawk jazz club
in San Francisco. Stitt's playing with the group is found on a recording made in Olympia
, Paris (where Davis and Coltrane had played a few months before) and the Live in Stockholm album.
In 1963, Davis' longtime rhythm section of Kelly, Chambers, and Cobb departed. He quickly got to work putting together a new group, including tenor saxophonist
George Coleman
and bassist Ron Carter
. Davis, Coleman, Carter and a few other musicians recorded half the tracks for an album in the spring of 1963. A few weeks later, seventeen-year-old drummer Tony Williams and pianist Herbie Hancock
joined the group, and soon afterward Davis, Coleman, and the new rhythm section recorded the rest of Seven Steps to Heaven
.
The rhythm players melded together quickly as a section and with the horns. The group's rapid evolution can be traced through the Seven Steps to Heaven album, In Europe (July 1963), My Funny Valentine
(February 1964), and Four and More (also February 1964). The quintet played essentially the same repertoire of bebop tunes and standards that earlier Davis bands had played, but they tackled them with increasing structural and rhythmic freedom and, in the case of the up-tempo material, breakneck speed.
Coleman left in the spring of 1964, to be replaced by avant-garde
saxophonist Sam Rivers
, on the suggestion of Tony Williams. Rivers remained in the group only briefly, but was recorded live with the quintet in Japan; this configuration can be heard on Miles in Tokyo! (July 1964).
By the end of the summer, Davis had persuaded Wayne Shorter
to leave Art Blakey
's Jazz Messengers and join the quintet. Shorter became the group's principal composer, and some of his compositions of this era (including "Footprints" and "Nefertiti") have become standards
. While on tour in Europe, the group quickly made their first official recording, Miles in Berlin (September 1964). On returning to the United States later that year, ever the musical entrepreneur, Davis (at Jackie DeShannon
's urging) was instrumental in getting The Byrds
signed to Columbia Records
.
By the time of E.S.P.
(1965), Davis' lineup consisted of Wayne Shorter
, Herbie Hancock
(piano), Ron Carter
(bass), and Tony Williams (drums). The last of his acoustic bands, this group is often referred to as the second great quintet.
A two-night Chicago performance in late 1965 is captured on The Complete Live at the Plugged Nickel 1965
, released in 1995. Unlike their studio albums, the live engagement shows the group still playing primarily standards and bebop tunes. It is reasonable to point out, though, that while some of the titles remain the same as the tunes employed by the 1950s quintet, the speed and distance of departure from the framework of the standards bears no comparison. It could even be said that the listening experience to these standards as live performances is as much of a radical take on the jazz of the time as the new compositions of the studio albums listed below.
The recording of Live at the Plugged Nickel was not issued anywhere in the 1960s, first appearing as a Japan-only partial issue in the late 1970s, then as a double-LP in the USA and Europe in 1982. It was followed by a series of studio recordings: Miles Smiles (1966), Sorcerer (1967), Nefertiti (1967), Miles in the Sky
(1968), and Filles de Kilimanjaro
(1968). The quintet's approach to improvisation came to be known as "time no changes" or "freebop," because they abandoned the more conventional chord-change
-based approach of bebop for a modal approach. Through Nefertiti, the studio recordings consisted primarily of originals composed by Shorter, with occasional compositions by the other sidemen. In 1967, the group began to play their live concerts in continuous sets, each tune flowing into the next, with only the melody indicating any sort of demarcation. Davis's bands would continue to perform in this way until his retirement in 1975.
Miles in the Sky and Filles de Kilimanjaro, on which electric bass, electric piano, and electric guitar were tentatively introduced on some tracks, pointed the way to the subsequent fusion
phase of Davis' career. Davis also began experimenting with more rock-oriented rhythms on these records. By the time the second half of Filles de Kilimanjaro had been recorded, bassist Dave Holland
and pianist Chick Corea
had replaced Carter and Hancock in the working band, though both Carter and Hancock would occasionally contribute to future recording sessions. Davis soon began to take over the compositional duties of his sidemen.
and funk
artists such as Sly and the Family Stone, James Brown, and Jimi Hendrix
, many of whom he met through Betty Mabry
(later Betty Davis), a young model and songwriter Davis married in September 1968 and divorced a year later. The musical transition required that Davis and his band adapt to electric instrument
s in both live performances and the studio. By the time In a Silent Way
had been recorded in February 1969, Davis had augmented his quintet with additional players. At various times Hancock or Joe Zawinul
was brought in to join Corea on electric keyboards
, and guitarist John McLaughlin
made the first of his many appearances with Davis. By this point, Shorter was also doubling on soprano saxophone. After recording this album, Williams left to form his group Lifetime and was replaced by Jack DeJohnette
.
Six months later an even larger group of musicians, including Jack DeJohnette
, Airto Moreira
, and Bennie Maupin
, recorded the double LP Bitches Brew
, which became a huge seller, reaching gold status by 1976. This album and In a Silent Way were among the first fusions of jazz and rock that were commercially successful, building on the groundwork laid by Charles Lloyd, Larry Coryell, and others who pioneered a genre that would become known as jazz-rock fusion. During this period, Davis toured with Shorter, Corea, Holland, and DeJohnette. The group's repertoire included material from Bitches Brew, In a Silent Way, and the 1960s quintet albums, along with an occasional standard.
In 1972, Davis was introduced to the music of Karlheinz Stockhausen
by Paul Buckmaster
, leading to a period of new creative exploration. Biographer J. K. Chambers wrote that "the effect of Davis' study of Stockhausen could not be repressed for long... Davis' own 'space music' shows Stockhausen's influence compositionally." His recordings and performances during this period were described as "space music" by fans, by music critic Leonard Feather
, and by Buckmaster, who described it as "a lot of mood changes—heavy, dark, intense—definitely space music." Both Bitches Brew
and In a Silent Way
feature "extended" (more than 20 minutes each) compositions that were never actually "played straight through" by the musicians in the studio. Instead, Davis and producer Teo Macero
selected musical motifs
of various lengths from recorded extended improvisations and edited them together into a musical whole that exists only in the recorded version. Bitches Brew
made use of such electronic effects as multi-tracking
, tape loop
s, and other editing techniques. Both records, especially Bitches Brew, proved to be big sellers. Starting with Bitches Brew, Davis' albums began to often feature cover art
much more in line with psychedelic
art or black power
movements than that of his earlier albums. He took significant cuts in his usual performing fees in order to open for rock groups like the Steve Miller Band
, the Grateful Dead
, Neil Young
, and Santana
. Several live albums were recorded during the early 1970s at these performances: Live at the Fillmore East, March 7, 1970: It's About That Time
(March 1970), Black Beauty
(April 1970), and Miles Davis at Fillmore: Live at the Fillmore East
(June 1970).
By the time of Live-Evil in December 1970, Davis' ensemble had transformed into a much more funk-oriented group. Davis began experimenting with wah-wah effects on his horn. The ensemble with Gary Bartz
, Keith Jarrett
, and Michael Henderson
, often referred to as the "Cellar Door band" (the live portions of Live-Evil were recorded at a Washington, DC, club by that name
), never recorded in the studio, but is documented in the six-CD box set The Cellar Door Sessions, which was recorded over four nights in December 1970. In 1970, Davis contributed extensively to the soundtrack of a documentary
about the African-American boxer heavyweight champion Jack Johnson
. Himself a devotee of boxing, Davis drew parallels between Johnson, whose career had been defined by the fruitless search for a Great White Hope to dethrone him, and Davis' own career, in which he felt the musical establishment of the time had prevented him from receiving the acclaim and rewards that were due him. The resulting album, 1971's A Tribute to Jack Johnson
, contained two long pieces that featured musicians (some of whom were not credited on the record) including guitarists John McLaughlin
and Sonny Sharrock
, Herbie Hancock
on a Farfisa
organ, and drummer Billy Cobham
. McLaughlin and Cobham went on to become founding members of the Mahavishnu Orchestra in 1971.
As Davis stated in his autobiography, he wanted to make music for the young African-American audience. On the Corner
(1972) blended funk elements with the traditional jazz styles he had played his entire career. The album was highlighted by the appearance of saxophonist Carlos Garnett
. Critics were not kind to the album; in his autobiography, Davis stated that critics could not figure out how to categorize it, and he complained that the album was not promoted by the "traditional" jazz radio stations. After recording On the Corner, Davis put together a new group, with only Michael Henderson
, Carlos Garnett
, and percussionist Mtume
returning from the previous band. It included guitarist Reggie Lucas
, tabla player Badal Roy
, sitarist Khalil Balakrishna, and drummer Al Foster
. It was unusual in that none of the sidemen were major jazz instrumentalists; as a result, the music emphasized rhythmic density and shifting textures instead of individual solos. This group, which recorded in the Philharmonic Hall
for the album In Concert
(1972), was unsatisfactory to Davis. Through the first half of 1973, he dropped the tabla
and sitar
, took over keyboard duties, and added guitarist Pete Cosey
. The Davis/Cosey/Lucas/Henderson/Mtume/Foster ensemble would remain virtually intact over the next two years. Initially, Dave Liebman
played saxophones and flute with the band; in 1974, he was replaced by Sonny Fortune
.
Big Fun (1974) was a double album containing four long improvisations, recorded between 1969 and 1972. Similarly, Get Up With It
(1974) collected recordings from the previous five years. Get Up With It included "He Loved Him Madly", a tribute to Duke Ellington, as well as one of Davis' most lauded pieces from this era, "Calypso Frelimo". It was his last studio album of the 1970s. In 1974 and 1975, Columbia recorded three double-LP live Davis albums: Dark Magus
, Agharta
, and Pangaea
. Dark Magus captures a 1974 New York concert; the latter two are recordings of consecutive concerts from the same February 1975 day in Osaka
. At the time, only Agharta was available in the US; Pangaea and Dark Magus were initially released only by CBS/Sony Japan. All three feature at least two electric guitarists (Reggie Lucas and Pete Cosey, deploying an array of Hendrix-inspired electronic distortion devices; Dominique Gaumont is a third guitarist on Dark Magus), electric bass, drums, reeds, and Davis on electric trumpet and organ. These albums were the last he was to record for five years. Davis was troubled by osteoarthritis (which led to a hip replacement operation in 1976, the first of several), sickle-cell anemia, depression, bursitis
, ulcers
, and a renewed dependence on alcohol and drugs (primarily cocaine), and his performances were routinely panned by critics throughout late 1974 and early 1975. By the time the group reached Japan in February 1975, Davis was nearing a physical breakdown and required copious amounts of alcohol and narcotics to make it through his engagements. Nonetheless, as noted by Richard Cook and Brian Morton, during these concerts his trumpet playing "is of the highest and most adventurous order."
After a Newport Jazz Festival
performance at Avery Fisher Hall
in New York on July 1, 1975, Davis withdrew almost completely from the public eye for six years. As Gil Evans said, "His organism is tired. And after all the music he's contributed for 35 years, he needs a rest." In his memoirs, Davis is characteristically candid about his wayward mental state during this period, describing himself as a hermit, his house as a wreck, and detailing his drug and sex addictions. In 1976, Rolling Stone
reported rumors of his imminent demise. Although he stopped practicing trumpet on a regular basis, Davis continued to compose intermittently and made three attempts at recording during his exile from performing; these sessions (one with the assistance of Paul Buckmaster and Gil Evans, who left after not receiving promised compensation) bore little fruit and remain unreleased. In 1979, he placed in the yearly top-ten trumpeter poll of Down Beat
. Columbia continued to issue compilation album
s and records of unreleased vault material to fulfill contractual obligations. During his period of inactivity, Davis saw the fusion music that he had spearheaded over the past decade enter into the mainstream. When he emerged from retirement, Davis' musical descendants would be in the realm of New Wave
rock, and in particular the styling of Prince
.
By 1979, Davis had rekindled his relationship with actress Cicely Tyson
. With Tyson, Davis would overcome his cocaine addiction and regain his enthusiasm for music. As he had not played trumpet for the better part of three years, regaining his famed embouchure
proved to be particularly arduous. While recording The Man with the Horn
(sessions were spread sporadically over 1979–1981), Davis played mostly wahwah with a younger, larger band.
The initial large band was eventually abandoned in favor of a smaller combo featuring saxophonist Bill Evans
and bass player Marcus Miller
, both of whom would be among Davis' most regular collaborators throughout the decade. He married Tyson in 1981; they would divorce in 1988. The Man with the Horn was finally released in 1981 and received a poor critical reception despite selling fairly well. In May, the new band played two dates as part of the Newport Jazz Festival
. The concerts, as well as the live recording We Want Miles
from the ensuing tour, received positive reviews.
By late 1982, Davis' band included French percussionist Mino Cinelu
and guitarist John Scofield
, with whom he worked closely on the album Star People
. In mid-1983, while working on the tracks for Decoy
, an album mixing soul music
and electronica
that was released in 1984, Davis brought in producer, composer and keyboardist Robert Irving III
, who had earlier collaborated with him on The Man with the Horn. With a seven-piece band, including Scofield, Evans, keyboardist and music director Irving, drummer Al Foster
and bassist Darryl Jones
(later of The Rolling Stones
), Davis played a series of European gigs to positive receptions. While in Europe, he took part in the recording of Aura
, an orchestral tribute to Davis composed by Danish trumpeter Palle Mikkelborg
.
You're Under Arrest, Davis' next album, was released in 1985 and included another brief stylistic detour. Included on the album were his interpretations of Cyndi Lauper
's ballad "Time After Time
", and "Human Nature
" from Michael Jackson
. Davis considered releasing an entire album of pop songs and recorded dozens of them, but the idea was scrapped. Davis noted that many of today's accepted jazz standards were in fact pop songs from Broadway theater, and that he was simply updating the "standards" repertoire with new material. 1985 also saw Davis guest-star on the TV show Miami Vice
as pimp
and minor criminal Ivory Jones in the episode titled "Junk Love" (first aired November 8, 1985).
You're Under Arrest also proved to be Davis' final album for Columbia. Trumpeter Wynton Marsalis
publicly dismissed Davis' more recent fusion recordings as not being "'true' jazz", comments Davis initially shrugged off, calling Marsalis "a nice young man, only confused". This changed after Marsalis appeared, unannounced, onstage in the midst of Davis' performance at the inaugural Vancouver International Jazz Festival
in 1986. Marsalis whispered into Davis' ear that "someone" had told him to do so; Davis responded by ordering him off the stage.
Davis grew irritated at Columbia's delay releasing Aura. The breaking point in the label-artist relationship appears to have come when a Columbia jazz producer requested Davis place a goodwill birthday call to Marsalis. Davis signed with Warner Brothers
shortly thereafter.
Davis collaborated with a number of figures from the British new wave
movement during this period, including Scritti Politti
. At the invitation of producer Bill Laswell
, Davis recorded some trumpet parts during sessions for Public Image Ltd.
's Album, according to Public Image's John Lydon
in the liner notes of their Plastic Box box set. In Lydon's words, however, "strangely enough, we didn't use (his contributions)." (Also according to Lydon in the Plastic Box notes, Davis favorably compared Lydon's singing voice to his trumpet sound.)
Having first taken part in the Artists United Against Apartheid
recording, Davis signed with Warner Brothers records and reunited with Marcus Miller
. The resulting record, Tutu
(1986), would be his first to use modern studio tools—programmed synthesizers, samples
and drum loops—to create an entirely new setting for his playing. Ecstatically reviewed on its release, the album would frequently be described as the modern counterpart of Sketches of Spain and won a Grammy in 1987.
He followed Tutu with Amandla
, another collaboration with Miller and George Duke
, plus the soundtracks to four movies: Street Smart
, Siesta
, The Hot Spot
(with bluesman John Lee Hooker
), and Dingo. He continued to tour with a band of constantly rotating personnel and a critical stock at a level higher than it had been for 15 years. His last recordings, both released posthumously, were the hip hop
-influenced studio album Doo-Bop
and Miles & Quincy Live at Montreux
, a collaboration with Quincy Jones
for the 1991 Montreux Jazz Festival
in which Davis performed the repertoire from his 1940s and 1950s recordings for the first time in decades.
In 1988 he had a small part as a street musician in the film Scrooged
, starring Bill Murray
. In 1989, Davis was interviewed on 60 Minutes
by Harry Reasoner. He received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award
in 1990.
In early 1991, he appeared in the Rolf de Heer
film Dingo
as a jazz musician. In the film's opening sequence, Davis and his band unexpectedly land on a remote airstrip in the Australian outback and proceed to perform for the stunned locals. The performance was one of Davis' last on film.
Miles Davis died on September 28, 1991 from the combined effects of a stroke, pneumonia
and respiratory failure
in Santa Monica, California
at the age of 65. He is buried in Woodlawn Cemetery in The Bronx.
is the best-selling album in the history of jazz music and was praised by the United States House of Representatives
to "pass a symbolic resolution honoring the masterpiece and reaffirming jazz as a national treasure."
Many well-known musicians rose to prominence as members of Davis' ensembles, including saxophonists Gerry Mulligan
, John Coltrane
, Cannonball Adderley, George Coleman
, Wayne Shorter
, Dave Liebman
, Branford Marsalis
and Kenny Garrett
; trombonist J. J. Johnson; pianists Horace Silver
, Red Garland
, Wynton Kelly
, Bill Evans
, Herbie Hancock
, Joe Zawinul
, Chick Corea
, Keith Jarrett
and Kei Akagi
; guitarists John McLaughlin
, Pete Cosey
, John Scofield
and Mike Stern
; bassists Paul Chambers
, Ron Carter
, Dave Holland
, Marcus Miller
and Darryl Jones
; and drummers Elvin Jones
, Philly Joe Jones
, Jimmy Cobb
, Tony Williams, Billy Cobham
, Jack DeJohnette
, and Al Foster
.
As an innovative bandleader and composer, Miles Davis has influenced many notable musicians and bands from diverse genres. These include Wayne Shorter
, Cannonball Adderley, Herbie Hancock
, Cassandra Wilson
, Lalo Schifrin
, Tangerine Dream
, Brand X
, Mtume
, Benny Bailey
, Joe Bonner
, Don Cherry
, Urszula Dudziak
, Sugizo
, Bill Evans
, Bill Hardman
, The Lounge Lizards
, Hugh Masekela
, John McLaughlin
, King Crimson
, Steely Dan
, Frank Zappa
, Duane Allman
, Radiohead
, The Flaming Lips
, Lydia Lunch
, Talk Talk
, Michael Franks, Sting, Lonnie Liston Smith
, Jiří Stivín
, Tim Hagans
, Julie Christensen
, Jerry Garcia
, David Grisman
, Vassar Clements
, Snooky Young
, Prince
, and Christian Scott
.
Miles' influence on the people who played with him has been described by music writer and author Christopher Smith as follows:
His approach, owing largely to the African American performance tradition that focused on individual expression, emphatic interaction, and creative response to shifting contents, had a profound impact on generations of jazz musicians.
In 1986, the New England Conservatory awarded Miles Davis an Honorary Doctorate
for his extraordinary contributions to music. Since 1960 the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences
(NARAS) has honored him with eight Grammy Awards, a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, and three Grammy Hall of Fame Awards.
In 2010, Moldejazz
premiered a play called Driving Miles which focused on a landmark concert Davis performed in Molde
, Norway, in 1984.
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
musician, trumpeter, bandleader
Bandleader
A bandleader is the leader of a band of musicians. The term is most commonly, though not exclusively, used with a group that plays popular music as a small combo or a big band, such as one which plays jazz, blues, rhythm and blues or rock and roll music....
, and composer. Widely considered one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century, Miles Davis was, with his musical groups, at the forefront of several major developments in jazz music, including bebop
Bebop
Bebop differed drastically from the straightforward compositions of the swing era, and was instead characterized by fast tempos, asymmetrical phrasing, intricate melodies, and rhythm sections that expanded on their role as tempo-keepers...
, cool jazz
Cool jazz
Cool is a style of modern jazz music that arose following the Second World War. It is characterized by its relaxed tempos and lighter tone, in contrast to the bebop style that preceded it...
, hard bop
Hard bop
Hard bop is a style of jazz that is an extension of bebop music. Journalists and record companies began using the term in the mid-1950s to describe a new current within jazz which incorporated influences from rhythm and blues, gospel music, and blues, especially in the saxophone and piano...
, modal jazz
Modal jazz
Modal jazz is jazz that uses musical modes rather than chord progressions as a harmonic framework. Originating in the late 1950s and 1960s, modal jazz is characterized by Miles Davis's "Milestones" Kind of Blue and John Coltrane's classic quartet from 1960–64. Other important performers include...
, and jazz fusion
Jazz fusion
Jazz fusion is a musical fusion genre that developed from mixing funk and R&B rhythms and the amplification and electronic effects of rock, complex time signatures derived from non-Western music and extended, typically instrumental compositions with a jazz approach to lengthy group improvisations,...
.
On October 7, 2008, his 1959 album Kind of Blue
Kind of Blue
Kind of Blue is a studio album by American jazz musician Miles Davis, released August 17, 1959, on Columbia Records in the United States. Recording sessions for the album took place at Columbia's 30th Street Studio in New York City on March 2 and April 22, 1959...
received its fourth platinum
RIAA certification
In the United States, the Recording Industry Association of America awards certification based on the number of albums and singles sold through retail and other ancillary markets. Other countries have similar awards...
certification from the Recording Industry Association of America
Recording Industry Association of America
The Recording Industry Association of America is a trade organization that represents the recording industry distributors in the United States...
(RIAA), for shipments of at least four million copies in the United States. Miles Davis was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum is a museum located on the shore of Lake Erie in downtown Cleveland, Ohio, United States. It is dedicated to archiving the history of some of the best-known and most influential artists, producers, engineers and others who have, in some major way,...
in 2006. Davis was noted as "one of the key figures in the history of jazz".
On November 5, 2009, Rep. John Conyers
John Conyers
John Conyers, Jr. is the U.S. Representative for , serving since 1965 . He is a member of the Democratic Party...
of Michigan sponsored a measure in the US House of Representatives to recognize and commemorate the album Kind of Blue
Kind of Blue
Kind of Blue is a studio album by American jazz musician Miles Davis, released August 17, 1959, on Columbia Records in the United States. Recording sessions for the album took place at Columbia's 30th Street Studio in New York City on March 2 and April 22, 1959...
on its 50th anniversary. The measure also affirms jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
as a national treasure and "encourages the United States government to preserve and advance the art form of jazz music." It passed, unanimously, with a vote of 409–0 on December 15, 2009.
Early life (1926–44)
Miles Dewey Davis was born on May 26, 1926, to an affluent African American family in AltonAlton, Illinois
Alton is a city on the Mississippi River in Madison County, Illinois, United States, about north of St. Louis, Missouri. The population was 27,865 at the 2010 census. It is a part of the Metro-East region of the Greater St. Louis metropolitan area in Southern Illinois...
, Illinois. His father, Dr. Miles Henry Davis
Miles Henry Davis
Miles Henry Davis was a prominent American dentist and father of jazz legend Miles Davis.-Biography:Davis was born on March 1, 1898 in Noble Lake, Arkansas. He was a son of Miles D. and Mary Davis...
, was a dentist. In 1927 the family moved to East St. Louis, Illinois
East St. Louis, Illinois
East St. Louis is a city located in St. Clair County, Illinois, USA, directly across the Mississippi River from St. Louis, Missouri in the Metro-East region of Southern Illinois. As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 27,006, less than one-third of its peak of 82,366 in 1950...
. They also owned a substantial ranch in northern Arkansas
Arkansas
Arkansas is a state located in the southern region of the United States. Its name is an Algonquian name of the Quapaw Indians. Arkansas shares borders with six states , and its eastern border is largely defined by the Mississippi River...
, where Davis learned to ride horses as a boy.
Davis' mother, Cleota Mae (Henry) Davis, wanted her son to learn the piano; she was a capable blues pianist but kept this fact hidden from her son. His musical studies began at 13, when his father gave him a trumpet and arranged lessons with local musician Elwood Buchanan
Elwood Buchanan
Elwood C. Buchanan, Sr was an American jazz trumpeter and teacher who became an early mentor of Miles Davis.Buchanan was born in St Louis, Missouri on January 26, 1907, and was trained in music by Joseph Gustat, the principal trumpeter with the St Louis Symphony Orchestra...
. Davis later suggested that his father's instrument choice was made largely to irk his wife, who disliked the trumpet's sound. Against the fashion of the time, Buchanan stressed the importance of playing without vibrato
Vibrato
Vibrato is a musical effect consisting of a regular, pulsating change of pitch. It is used to add expression to vocal and instrumental music. Vibrato is typically characterised in terms of two factors: the amount of pitch variation and the speed with which the pitch is varied .-Vibrato and...
; he was reported to have slapped Davis' knuckles every time he started using heavy vibrato
Vibrato
Vibrato is a musical effect consisting of a regular, pulsating change of pitch. It is used to add expression to vocal and instrumental music. Vibrato is typically characterised in terms of two factors: the amount of pitch variation and the speed with which the pitch is varied .-Vibrato and...
. Davis would carry his clear signature tone throughout his career. He once remarked on its importance to him, saying, "I prefer a round sound with no attitude in it, like a round voice with not too much tremolo
Tremolo
Tremolo, or tremolando, is a musical term that describes various trembling effects, falling roughly into two types. The first is a rapid reiteration...
and not too much bass. Just right in the middle. If I can’t get that sound I can’t play anything." Clark Terry
Clark Terry
Clark Terry is an American swing and bop trumpeter, a pioneer of the fluegelhorn in jazz, educator, NEA Jazz Masters inductee, and recipient of the 2010 Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award...
was another important early influence.
By age 16, Davis was a member of the music society and playing professionally when not at school. At 17, he spent a year playing in Eddie Randle's band, the Blue Devils. During this time, Sonny Stitt
Sonny Stitt
Edward "Sonny" Stitt was an American jazz saxophonist of the bebop/hard bop idiom. He was also one of the best-documented saxophonists of his generation, recording over 100 albums in his lifetime...
tried to persuade him to join the Tiny Bradshaw band, then passing through town, but Davis' mother insisted that he finish his final year of high school.
In 1944, the Billy Eckstine
Billy Eckstine
William Clarence Eckstine was an American singer of ballads and a bandleader of the swing era. Eckstine's smooth baritone and distinctive vibrato broke down barriers throughout the 1940s, first as leader of the original bop big-band, then as the first romantic black male in popular...
band visited East St. Louis. Dizzy Gillespie
Dizzy Gillespie
John Birks "Dizzy" Gillespie was an American jazz trumpet player, bandleader, singer, and composer dubbed "the sound of surprise".Together with Charlie Parker, he was a major figure in the development of bebop and modern jazz...
and Charlie Parker
Charlie Parker
Charles Parker, Jr. , famously called Bird or Yardbird, was an American jazz saxophonist and composer....
were members of the band, and Davis was brought in on third trumpet for a couple of weeks because the regular player, Buddy Anderson, was out sick. Even after this experience, once Eckstine's band left town, Davis' parents were still keen for him to continue formal academic studies.
New York and the bebop years begin (1944–48)
In the fall of 1944, following graduation from high school, Davis moved to New York City to study at the Juilliard SchoolJuilliard School
The Juilliard School, located at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York City, United States, is a performing arts conservatory which was established in 1905...
of Music.
Upon arriving in New York, he spent most of his first weeks in town trying to get in contact with Charlie Parker
Charlie Parker
Charles Parker, Jr. , famously called Bird or Yardbird, was an American jazz saxophonist and composer....
, despite being advised against doing so by several people he met during his quest, including saxophonist
Saxophone
The saxophone is a conical-bore transposing musical instrument that is a member of the woodwind family. Saxophones are usually made of brass and played with a single-reed mouthpiece similar to that of the clarinet. The saxophone was invented by the Belgian instrument maker Adolphe Sax in 1846...
Coleman Hawkins
Coleman Hawkins
Coleman Randolph Hawkins was an American jazz tenor saxophonist. Hawkins was one of the first prominent jazz musicians on his instrument. As Joachim E. Berendt explained, "there were some tenor players before him, but the instrument was not an acknowledged jazz horn"...
.
Finally locating his idol, Davis became one of the cadre of musicians who held nightly jam session
Jam session
Jam sessions are often used by musicians to develop new material, find suitable arrangements, or simply as a social gathering and communal practice session. Jam sessions may be based upon existing songs or forms, may be loosely based on an agreed chord progression or chart suggested by one...
s at two of Harlem
Harlem
Harlem is a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Manhattan, which since the 1920s has been a major African-American residential, cultural and business center. Originally a Dutch village, formally organized in 1658, it is named after the city of Haarlem in the Netherlands...
's nightclubs, Minton's Playhouse
Minton's Playhouse
Minton’s Playhouse is a jazz club and bar located on the first floor of the Cecil Hotel at 210 West 118th Street in Harlem. Minton’s was founded by tenor saxophonist Henry Minton in 1938...
and Monroe's. The group included many of the future leaders of the bebop
Bebop
Bebop differed drastically from the straightforward compositions of the swing era, and was instead characterized by fast tempos, asymmetrical phrasing, intricate melodies, and rhythm sections that expanded on their role as tempo-keepers...
revolution: young players such as Fats Navarro
Fats Navarro
Theodore "Fats" Navarro was an American jazz trumpet player. He was a pioneer of the bebop style of jazz improvisation in the 1940s. He had a strong stylistic influence on many other players, most notably Clifford Brown.-Life:Navarro was born in Key West, Florida, to Cuban-Black-Chinese parentage...
, Freddie Webster
Freddie Webster
Freddie Webster was a jazz trumpeter who, Dizzy Gillespie once said, "had the best sound on trumpet since the trumpet was invented--just alive and full of life." He is perhaps best known for being cited by Miles Davis as an early influence.Webster was born in Cleveland, Ohio...
, and J. J. Johnson. Established musicians including Thelonious Monk
Thelonious Monk
Thelonious Sphere Monk was an American jazz pianist and composer considered "one of the giants of American music". Monk had a unique improvisational style and made numerous contributions to the standard jazz repertoire, including "Epistrophy", "'Round Midnight", "Blue Monk", "Straight, No Chaser"...
and Kenny Clarke
Kenny Clarke
Kenny Clarke , born Kenneth Spearman Clarke, nicknamed "Klook" and later known as Liaqat Ali Salaam, was a jazz drummer and an early innovator of the bebop style of drumming...
were also regular participants.
Davis dropped out of Juilliard, after asking permission from his father. In his autobiography, Davis criticized the Juilliard classes for centering too much on the classical European and "white" repertoire. However, he also acknowledged that Juilliard helped give him a grounding in music theory that would prove valuable in later years.
Davis began playing professionally, performing in several 52nd Street clubs with Coleman Hawkins and Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis. In 1945, he entered a recording studio for the first time, as a member of Herbie Fields
Herbie Fields
Herbie Fields was a jazz musician. He attended New York's famed Juilliard School of Music and served in the U.S. Army from 1941–1943.-Career:...
's group. This was the first of many recordings to which Davis contributed in this period, mostly as a sideman
Sideman
A sideman is a professional musician who is hired to perform or record with a group of which he or she is not a regular member. They often tour with solo acts as well as bands and jazz ensembles. Sidemen are generally required to be adaptable to many different styles of music, and so able to fit...
. He finally got the chance to record as a leader in 1946, with an occasional group called the Miles Davis Sextet plus Earl Coleman and Ann Hathaway—one of the rare occasions when Davis, by then a member of the groundbreaking Charlie Parker Quintet, can be heard accompanying singers. In these early years, recording sessions where Davis was the leader were the exception rather than the rule; his next date as leader would not come until 1947.
Around 1945, Dizzy Gillespie
Dizzy Gillespie
John Birks "Dizzy" Gillespie was an American jazz trumpet player, bandleader, singer, and composer dubbed "the sound of surprise".Together with Charlie Parker, he was a major figure in the development of bebop and modern jazz...
parted ways with Parker, and Davis was hired as Gillespie's replacement in his quintet, which also featured Max Roach
Max Roach
Maxwell Lemuel "Max" Roach was an American jazz percussionist, drummer, and composer.A pioneer of bebop, Roach went on to work in many other styles of music, and is generally considered alongside the most important drummers in history...
on drums, Al Haig
Al Haig
Alan Warren Haig was an American jazz pianist, best known as one of the pioneers of bebop.Haig was born in Newark, New Jersey...
(replaced later by Sir Charles Thompson and Duke Jordan
Duke Jordan
Irving Sidney "Duke" Jordan was an American jazz pianist.-Biography:An imaginative and gifted pianist, Jordan was a regular member of Charlie Parker's so-called "classic quintet" , featuring Miles Davis...
) on piano, and Curley Russell
Curley Russell
Dillon "Curley" Russell was an American jazz double-bassist, who played bass on many bebop recordings.A member of the Tadd Dameron Sextet, in his heyday he was in demand for his ability to play at the rapid tempos typical of bebop, and appears on several key recordings of the period...
(later replaced by Tommy Potter
Tommy Potter
Charles Thomas Potter, born in Philadelphia on September 21, 1918, died March 1, 1988, was a jazz double bass player.Potter is known for having been a member of Charlie Parker's "classic quintet", with Miles Davis, between 1947 and 1950; he had first played with Parker in 1944, in Billy Eckstine's...
and Leonard Gaskin
Leonard Gaskin
Leonard Gaskin was an American jazz bassist born in New York City.Gaskin played on the early bebop scene at Minton's and Monroe's in New York in the early 1940s...
) on bass.
With Parker's quintet, Davis went into the studio several times, already showing hints of the style for which he would become known. On an oft-quoted take of Parker's signature song, "Now's the Time", Davis takes a melodic solo, whose unbop-like quality anticipates the "cool jazz
Cool jazz
Cool is a style of modern jazz music that arose following the Second World War. It is characterized by its relaxed tempos and lighter tone, in contrast to the bebop style that preceded it...
" period that would follow. The Parker quintet also toured widely. During a stop in Los Angeles, Parker had a nervous breakdown
Nervous breakdown
Mental breakdown is a non-medical term used to describe an acute, time-limited phase of a specific disorder that presents primarily with features of depression or anxiety.-Definition:...
that landed him in the Camarillo State Mental Hospital
Camarillo State Mental Hospital
Camarillo State Mental Hospital, also known as Camarillo State Hospital, was a psychiatric hospital for both developmentally disabled and mentally ill patients in Camarillo, California. The hospital closed in 1997. The site has been redeveloped as the California State University, Channel Islands...
for several months, and Davis found himself stranded. He roomed and collaborated for some time with bassist Charles Mingus
Charles Mingus
Charles Mingus Jr. was an American jazz musician, composer, bandleader, and civil rights activist.Mingus's compositions retained the hot and soulful feel of hard bop and drew heavily from black gospel music while sometimes drawing on elements of Third stream, free jazz, and classical music...
, before getting a job on Billy Eckstine
Billy Eckstine
William Clarence Eckstine was an American singer of ballads and a bandleader of the swing era. Eckstine's smooth baritone and distinctive vibrato broke down barriers throughout the 1940s, first as leader of the original bop big-band, then as the first romantic black male in popular...
's California tour, which eventually brought him back to New York. In 1948, Parker returned to New York, and Davis rejoined his group.
The relationships within the quintet, however, were growing tense. Parker's erratic behavior (attributable to his well-known drug addiction) and artistic choices (both Davis and Roach objected to having Duke Jordan as a pianist and would have preferred Bud Powell
Bud Powell
Earl Rudolph "Bud" Powell was an American Jazz pianist. Powell has been described as one of "the two most significant pianists of the style of modern jazz that came to be known as bop", the other being his friend and contemporary Thelonious Monk...
) became sources of friction. In December 1948, disputes over money (Davis claims he was not being paid) began to strain their relationship even further. Davis finally left the group following a confrontation with Parker at the Royal Roost.
For Davis, his departure from Parker's group marked the beginning of a period in which he worked mainly as a freelancer and as a sideman in some of the most important combos on the New York jazz scene.
Birth of the Cool (1948–49)
In 1948 Davis grew close to the Canadian composer and arranger Gil EvansGil Evans
Gil Evans was a jazz pianist, arranger, composer and bandleader, active in the United States...
. Evans' basement apartment had become the meeting place for several young musicians and composers (including Davis, Roach, pianist John Lewis
John Lewis (pianist)
John Aaron Lewis was an American jazz pianist and composer best known as the musical director of the Modern Jazz Quartet.- Early life:...
, and baritone sax player Gerry Mulligan
Gerry Mulligan
Gerald Joseph "Gerry" Mulligan was an American jazz saxophonist, clarinetist, composer and arranger. Though Mulligan is primarily known as one of the leading baritone saxophonists in jazz history – playing the instrument with a light and airy tone in the era of cool jazz – he was also...
) unhappy with the increasingly virtuoso instrumental techniques that dominated the bebop scene of the time. Evans had been the arranger for the Claude Thornhill
Claude Thornhill
Claude Thornhill was an American pianist, arranger, composer, and bandleader...
orchestra, and it was the sound of this group, as well as Duke Ellington
Duke Ellington
Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington was an American composer, pianist, and big band leader. Ellington wrote over 1,000 compositions...
's example, that suggested the creation of an unusual line-up: a nonet
Nonet (music)
In music, a nonet is a composition which requires nine musicians for a performance, or a musical group that consists of nine people. The standard nonet scoring is for wind quintet, violin, viola, cello, and contrabass, though other combinations are also found...
including a French horn and a tuba
Tuba
The tuba is the largest and lowest-pitched brass instrument. Sound is produced by vibrating or "buzzing" the lips into a large cupped mouthpiece. It is one of the most recent additions to the modern symphony orchestra, first appearing in the mid-19th century, when it largely replaced the...
(this accounts for the "tuba band" moniker that was to be associated with the combo).
Davis took an active role in the project, so much so that it soon became "his project". The objective was to achieve a sound similar to the human voice, through carefully arranged compositions and by emphasizing a relaxed, melodic approach to the improvisations.
The nonet debuted in the summer of 1948, with a two-week engagement at the Royal Roost. The sign announcing the performance gave a surprising prominence to the role of the arrangers: "Miles Davis Nonet. Arrangements by Gil Evans
Gil Evans
Gil Evans was a jazz pianist, arranger, composer and bandleader, active in the United States...
, John Lewis and Gerry Mulligan
Gerry Mulligan
Gerald Joseph "Gerry" Mulligan was an American jazz saxophonist, clarinetist, composer and arranger. Though Mulligan is primarily known as one of the leading baritone saxophonists in jazz history – playing the instrument with a light and airy tone in the era of cool jazz – he was also...
". It was, in fact, so unusual that Davis had to persuade the Roost's manager, Ralph Watkins, to allow the sign to be worded in this way; he prevailed only with the help of Monte Kay
Monte Kay
Monte Kay, September 18, 1924 – May 25, 1988 was a prominent figure of the New York jazz scene in the late 1940s and 1950s, producing - often in association with the disc jockey Symphony Sid - several young musicians and acting as musical director of several night clubs...
, the club's artistic director.
The nonet was active until the end of 1949, along the way undergoing several changes in personnel: Roach and Davis were constantly featured, along with Mulligan, tuba player Bill Barber
Bill Barber (musician)
John William Barber, known as Bill Barber or Billy Barber is considered by many to be the first person to play tuba in modern jazz. He is best known for his work with Miles Davis on albums such as Birth of the Cool, Sketches of Spain and Miles Ahead...
, and alto saxophonist Lee Konitz
Lee Konitz
Lee Konitz is an American jazz composer and alto saxophonist born in Chicago, Illinois.Generally considered one of the driving forces of Cool Jazz, Konitz has also performed successfully in bebop and avant-garde settings...
, who had been preferred to Sonny Stitt
Sonny Stitt
Edward "Sonny" Stitt was an American jazz saxophonist of the bebop/hard bop idiom. He was also one of the best-documented saxophonists of his generation, recording over 100 albums in his lifetime...
(whose playing was considered too bop-oriented). Over the months, John Lewis alternated with Al Haig on piano, Mike Zwerin
Mike Zwerin
Mike Zwerin was an American cool jazz musician and author. Zwerin as a musician played the trombone and bass trumpet within various jazz ensembles. He was active within the jazz and prog. jazz musical community as a session musician...
with Kai Winding
Kai Winding
Kai Chresten Winding was a popular Danish-born American trombonist and jazz composer. He is well known for a successful collaboration with fellow trombonist J. J. Johnson.-Biography:...
on trombone (Johnson was touring at the time), Junior Collins
Junior Collins
Addison Collins, Jr. was an American French horn player.A member of Glenn Miller's Army Air Force band, and Claude Thornhill's orchestra, he went on to play with Charlie Parker, Gerry Mulligan and others....
with Sandy Siegelstein and Gunther Schuller
Gunther Schuller
Gunther Schuller is an American composer, conductor, horn player, author, historian, and jazz musician.- Biography and works :...
on French horn, and Al McKibbon
Al McKibbon
Al McKibbon was an American jazz double bassist, known for his work in bop, hard bop, and Latin jazz.In 1947, after working with Lucky Millinder, Tab Smith, J. C. Heard, and Coleman Hawkins, he replaced Ray Brown in Dizzy Gillespie's band, in which he played until 1950...
with Joe Shulman
Joe Shulman
Joseph "Joe" Shulman was an American jazz bassist.Shulman's first professional experience was with Scat Davis in 1940, which he followed with a stint alongside Les Brown in 1942. He joined the military in 1943, and recorded with Django Reinhardt while a member of Glenn Miller's wartime band...
on bass. Singer Kenny Hagood
Kenny Hagood
Kenny "Pancho" Hagood was an American jazz vocalist.-Biography:Hagood was born in Detroit, Michigan and first sang at age 17 with Benny Carter. He sang with the Dizzy Gillespie Orchestra from 1946 to 1948 and then with Tadd Dameron later in 1948...
was added for one track during the recording
The presence of white musicians in the group angered some black jazz players, many of whom were unemployed at the time, but Davis rebuffed their criticisms.
A contract with Capitol Records
Capitol Records
Capitol Records is a major United States based record label, formerly located in Los Angeles, but operating in New York City as part of Capitol Music Group. Its former headquarters building, the Capitol Tower, is a major landmark near the corner of Hollywood and Vine...
granted the nonet several recording sessions between January 1949 and April 1950. The material they recorded was released in 1956 on an album whose title, Birth of the Cool
Birth of the Cool
Birth of the Cool is a compilation album by American jazz musician Miles Davis, released in 1957 on Capitol Records. It compiles twelve songs recorded by Davis's nonet for the label over the course of three sessions during 1949 and 1950...
, gave its name to the "cool jazz
Cool jazz
Cool is a style of modern jazz music that arose following the Second World War. It is characterized by its relaxed tempos and lighter tone, in contrast to the bebop style that preceded it...
" movement that developed at the same time and partly shared the musical direction begun by Davis' group.
For his part, Davis was fully aware of the importance of the project, which he pursued to the point of turning down a job with Duke Ellington
Duke Ellington
Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington was an American composer, pianist, and big band leader. Ellington wrote over 1,000 compositions...
's orchestra.
The importance of the nonet experience would become clear to critics and the larger public only in later years, but, at least commercially, the nonet was not a success. The liner notes
Liner notes
Liner notes are the writings found in booklets which come inserted into the compact disc jewel case or the equivalent packaging for vinyl records and cassettes.-Origin:...
of the first recordings of the Davis Quintet for Columbia Records
Columbia Records
Columbia Records is an American record label, owned by Japan's Sony Music Entertainment, operating under the Columbia Music Group with Aware Records. It was founded in 1888, evolving from an earlier enterprise, the American Graphophone Company — successor to the Volta Graphophone Company...
call it one of the most spectacular failures of the jazz club scene. This was bitterly noted by Davis, who claimed the invention of the cool style and resented the success that was later enjoyed—in large part because of the media's attention—by white "cool jazz" musicians (Mulligan and Dave Brubeck
Dave Brubeck
David Warren "Dave" Brubeck is an American jazz pianist. He has written a number of jazz standards, including "In Your Own Sweet Way" and "The Duke". Brubeck's style ranges from refined to bombastic, reflecting his mother's attempts at classical training and his improvisational skills...
in particular).
This experience also marked the beginning of the lifelong friendship between Davis and Gil Evans, an alliance that would bear important results in the years to follow.
Hard bop and the "Blue Period" (1950–54)
The first half of the 1950s was, for Davis, a period of great personal difficulty. At the end of 1949, he went on tour in Paris with a group including Tadd DameronTadd Dameron
Tadley Ewing Peake "Tadd" Dameron was an American jazz composer, arranger and pianist. Saxophonist Dexter Gordon called Dameron the "romanticist" of the bop movement, while reviewer Scott Yanow writes that Dameron was the "definitive arranger/composer of the bop era".-Biography:Born in Cleveland,...
, Kenny Clarke
Kenny Clarke
Kenny Clarke , born Kenneth Spearman Clarke, nicknamed "Klook" and later known as Liaqat Ali Salaam, was a jazz drummer and an early innovator of the bebop style of drumming...
(who remained in Europe after the tour), and James Moody
James Moody (saxophonist)
James Moody was an American jazz saxophone and flute player. He was best known for his hit "Moody's Mood for Love," an improvisation based on "I'm in the Mood for Love"; in performance, he often improvised vocals for the tune.-Biography:James Moody was born in Savannah, Georgia...
. Davis was fascinated by Paris and its cultural environment, where black jazz musicians, and African Americans in general, often felt better respected than they did in their homeland. While in Paris, Davis began a relationship with French actress and singer Juliette Gréco
Juliette Gréco
Juliette Gréco, — also Michelle – is a French actress and popular chanson singer.-Early life and family:Juliette Gréco was born in Montpellier to a Corsican father and a mother who became active in the Résistance, in the Hérault département of southern France. She was raised by her maternal...
.
Many of his new and old friends (Davis, in his autobiography, mentions Clarke) tried to persuade him to stay in France, but Davis decided to return to New York. Back in the States, he began to feel deeply depressed. The depression was due in part to his separation from Gréco, in part to his feeling underappreciated by the critics (who were hailing Davis' former collaborators as leaders of the cool jazz movement), and in part to the unraveling of his liaison with a former St. Louis schoolmate who was living with him in New York and with whom he had two children.
These are the factors to which Davis traces a heroin habit that deeply affected him for the next four years. Though Davis denies it in his autobiography, it is also likely that the environment in which he was living played a role. Most of Davis' associates at the time, some of them perhaps in imitation of Charlie Parker, had drug addictions of their own (among them, sax players Sonny Rollins
Sonny Rollins
Theodore Walter "Sonny" Rollins is a Grammy-winning American jazz tenor saxophonist. Rollins is widely recognized as one of the most important and influential jazz musicians. A number of his compositions, including "St...
and Dexter Gordon
Dexter Gordon
Dexter Gordon was an American jazz tenor saxophonist and an Academy Award-nominated actor . He is regarded as one of the first and most important musicians to adapt the bebop musical language of people like Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, and Bud Powell to the tenor saxophone...
, trumpeters Fats Navarro
Fats Navarro
Theodore "Fats" Navarro was an American jazz trumpet player. He was a pioneer of the bebop style of jazz improvisation in the 1940s. He had a strong stylistic influence on many other players, most notably Clifford Brown.-Life:Navarro was born in Key West, Florida, to Cuban-Black-Chinese parentage...
and Freddie Webster
Freddie Webster
Freddie Webster was a jazz trumpeter who, Dizzy Gillespie once said, "had the best sound on trumpet since the trumpet was invented--just alive and full of life." He is perhaps best known for being cited by Miles Davis as an early influence.Webster was born in Cleveland, Ohio...
, and drummer Art Blakey
Art Blakey
Arthur "Art" Blakey , known later as Abdullah Ibn Buhaina, was an American Grammy Award-winning jazz drummer and bandleader. He was a member of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community....
). For the next four years, Davis supported his habit partly with his music and partly by living the life of a hustler. By 1953, his drug addiction was beginning to impair his ability to perform. Heroin had killed some of his friends (Navarro and Freddie Webster). He himself had been arrested for drug possession while on tour in Los Angeles, and his drug habit had been made public in a devastating interview that Cab Calloway
Cab Calloway
Cabell "Cab" Calloway III was an American jazz singer and bandleader. He was strongly associated with the Cotton Club in Harlem, New York City where he was a regular performer....
gave to Down Beat.
Realizing his precarious condition, Davis tried several times to end his drug addiction, finally succeeding in 1954 after returning to his father's home in St. Louis for several months and literally locking himself in a room until he had gone through a painful withdrawal. During this period he avoided New York and played mostly in Detroit and other midwestern towns, where drugs were then harder to come by. A widely-related story, attributed to Richard (Prophet) Jennings was that Davis, while in Detroit playing at the Blue Bird club as a guest soloist in Billy Mitchell
Billy Mitchell (jazz musician)
Billy Mitchell was an American jazz tenor saxophonist known for his close association with fellow Detroiter Thad Jones and work with a variety of big bands including Woody Herman when he replaced Gene Ammons in his band...
's house band along with Tommy Flanagan
Tommy Flanagan
Thomas Lee Flanagan was an American jazz pianist born in Detroit, Michigan, particularly remembered for his work with Ella Fitzgerald...
, Elvin Jones
Elvin Jones
Elvin Ray Jones was a jazz drummer of the post-bop era. He showed interest in drums at a young age, watching the circus bands march by his family's home in Pontiac, Michigan....
, Betty Carter
Betty Carter
Betty Carter was an American jazz singer renowned for her improvisational technique and idiosyncratic vocal style...
, Yusef Lateef
Yusef Lateef
Dr. Yusef Lateef is an American Grammy Award-winning jazz multi-instrumentalist, composer, educator and a spokesman for the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community after his conversion to the Ahmadiyya sect of Islam in 1950.Although Lateef's main instruments are the tenor saxophone and flute, he is known for...
, Barry Harris
Barry Harris
Barry Doyle Harris is an American bebop jazz pianist and educator.-Biography:Harris left Detroit for New York City in 1960...
, Thad Jones
Thad Jones
Thaddeus Joseph Jones was an American jazz trumpeter, composer, and bandleader.-Biography:Thad Jones was born in Pontiac, Michigan to a musical family of ten . Thad Jones was a self taught musician, performing professionally by the age of sixteen...
, Curtis Fuller
Curtis Fuller
Curtis DuBois Fuller is an American jazz trombonist, known as a member of Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers and contributor to many classic jazz recordings.-Biography:...
and Donald Byrd
Donald Byrd
Donaldson Toussaint L'Ouverture Byrd II, is an American jazz and rhythm and blues trumpeter. A sideman for many other jazz musicians of his generation, Byrd is best known as one of the only bebop jazz musicians who successfully pioneered the funk and soul genres while simultaneously remaining a...
stumbled into Baker's Keyboard Lounge
Baker's Keyboard Lounge
Baker's Keyboard Lounge located on 20510 Livernois Street in Detroit, Michigan, claims to be the world's oldest operating jazz club, operating since May 1934.-Early History:...
out of the rain, soaking wet and carrying his trumpet in a paper bag under his coat, walked to the bandstand and interrupted Max Roach
Max Roach
Maxwell Lemuel "Max" Roach was an American jazz percussionist, drummer, and composer.A pioneer of bebop, Roach went on to work in many other styles of music, and is generally considered alongside the most important drummers in history...
and Clifford Brown
Clifford Brown
Clifford Brown , aka "Brownie," was an influential and highly rated American jazz trumpeter. He died aged 25, leaving behind only four years' worth of recordings...
in the midst of performing Sweet Georgia Brown
Sweet Georgia Brown
"Sweet Georgia Brown" is a jazz standard and pop tune written in 1925 by Ben Bernie and Maceo Pinkard and Kenneth Casey .The tune was first recorded on March 19, 1925 by bandleader Ben Bernie, resulting in a five-week No. 1 for Ben Bernie and his Hotel Roosevelt Orchestra...
by beginning to play My Funny Valentine
My Funny Valentine
"My Funny Valentine" is a show tune from the 1937 Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart musical Babes in Arms in which it was introduced by former child star Mitzi Green...
, and then, after finishing the song, stumbled back into the rainy night. Davis was supposedly embarrassed into getting clean by this incident. In his autobiography, Davis disputed this account, stating that Roach had requested that Davis play with him that night, and that the details of the incident, such as carrying his horn in a paper bag and interrupting Roach and Brown, were fictional and that his decision to quit heroin was unrelated to the incident.
Despite all the personal turmoil, the 1950–54 period was actually quite fruitful for Davis artistically. He made quite a number of recordings and had several collaborations with other important musicians. He got to know the music of Chicago pianist Ahmad Jamal
Ahmad Jamal
Ahmad Jamal is an innovative and influential American jazz pianist, composer, and educator. According to Stanley Crouch, Jamal is second in importance in the development of jazz after 1945 only to Charlie Parker...
, whose elegant approach and use of space influenced him deeply. He also definitively severed his stylistic ties with bebop.
In 1951, Davis met Bob Weinstock
Bob Weinstock
Bob Weinstock was an American record producer best known for his label Prestige Records, established in 1949, which was responsible for many significant jazz recordings during his more than two decades operating the firm.-Early life:As an 8-year-old, Weinstock bought "armfuls of records" by jazz...
, the owner of Prestige Records
Prestige Records
Prestige Records was a jazz record label founded in 1949 by Bob Weinstock. The company was located at 203 South Washington Avenue in Bergenfield, New Jersey, and recorded hundreds of albums by many of the leading jazz musicians of the day, sometimes issuing them under the names of several...
, and signed a contract with the label. Between 1951 and 1954, he released many records on Prestige, with several different combos. While the personnel of the recordings varied, the lineup often featured Sonny Rollins
Sonny Rollins
Theodore Walter "Sonny" Rollins is a Grammy-winning American jazz tenor saxophonist. Rollins is widely recognized as one of the most important and influential jazz musicians. A number of his compositions, including "St...
and Art Blakey
Art Blakey
Arthur "Art" Blakey , known later as Abdullah Ibn Buhaina, was an American Grammy Award-winning jazz drummer and bandleader. He was a member of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community....
. Davis was particularly fond of Rollins and tried several times, in the years that preceded his meeting with John Coltrane
John Coltrane
John William Coltrane was an American jazz saxophonist and composer. Working in the bebop and hard bop idioms early in his career, Coltrane helped pioneer the use of modes in jazz and later was at the forefront of free jazz...
, to recruit him for a regular group. He never succeeded, however, mostly because Rollins was prone to make himself unavailable for months at a time. In spite of the casual occasions that generated these recordings, their quality is almost always quite high, and they document the evolution of Davis' style and sound. During this time he began using the Harmon mute, held close to the microphone
Microphone
A microphone is an acoustic-to-electric transducer or sensor that converts sound into an electrical signal. In 1877, Emile Berliner invented the first microphone used as a telephone voice transmitter...
, in a way that grew to be his signature, and his phrasing, especially in ballad
Ballad
A ballad is a form of verse, often a narrative set to music. Ballads were particularly characteristic of British and Irish popular poetry and song from the later medieval period until the 19th century and used extensively across Europe and later the Americas, Australia and North Africa. Many...
s, became spacious, melodic, and relaxed. This sound was to become so characteristic that the use of the Harmon mute by any jazz trumpet player since immediately conjures up Miles Davis.
The most important Prestige recordings of this period (Dig
Dig (Miles Davis album)
Dig is an album by Miles Davis on Prestige Records, catalogue number 7012. Initially released in the ten-inch format in 1951, Dig was later reissued as a twelve-inch LP with additional tracks...
, Blue Haze
Blue Haze
Blue Haze is an album recorded in 1953 and 1954 by Miles Davis for Prestige Records. The first track on the album is from the 3 April 1954 session which resulted in half of the album Walkin...
, Bags' Groove
Bags' Groove
Bags' Groove is a jazz album recorded by Miles Davis in 1954 for Prestige Records. Both takes of the title track come from a session on December 24, 1954 . The rest of the album was recorded earlier in the year, on 29 June. Bags' Groove is a jazz album recorded by Miles Davis in 1954 for Prestige...
, Miles Davis and the Modern Jazz Giants, and Walkin'
Walkin'
-Performers:*Miles Davis - Trumpet*Lucky Thompson - Tenor saxophone *J. J. Johnson - Trombone *David Schildkraut - Alto saxophone *Horace Silver - Piano*Percy Heath - Bass*Kenny Clarke - drums...
) originated mostly from recording sessions in 1951 and 1954, after Davis' recovery from his addiction. Also of importance are his five Blue Note
Blue Note Records
Blue Note Records is a jazz record label, established in 1939 by Alfred Lion and Max Margulis. Francis Wolff became involved shortly afterwards. It derives its name from the characteristic "blue notes" of jazz and the blues. At the end of the 1950s, and in the early 1960s, Blue Note headquarters...
recordings, collected in the Miles Davis Volume 1
Miles Davis Volume 1
Miles Davis Volume 1 is an album which compiles tracks recorded by Miles Davis for Blue Note Records on 9 May 1952 and 6 March 1954. The music has been issued in a variety of formats over the years - the track listing below is that of the 2001 CD reissue containing all the music recorded at the...
album.
With these recordings, Davis assumed a central position in what is known as hard bop
Hard bop
Hard bop is a style of jazz that is an extension of bebop music. Journalists and record companies began using the term in the mid-1950s to describe a new current within jazz which incorporated influences from rhythm and blues, gospel music, and blues, especially in the saxophone and piano...
. In contrast with bebop, hard bop used slower tempos and a less radical approach to harmony and melody, often adopting popular tunes and standards from the American songbook as starting points for improvisation. Hard bop also distanced itself from cool jazz by virtue of a harder beat and by its constant reference to the blues
Blues
Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...
, both in its traditional form and in the form made popular by rhythm and blues
Rhythm and blues
Rhythm and blues, often abbreviated to R&B, is a genre of popular African American music that originated in the 1940s. The term was originally used by record companies to describe recordings marketed predominantly to urban African Americans, at a time when "urbane, rocking, jazz based music with a...
. A few critics go as far as to call Walkin the album that created hard bop, but the point is debatable, given the number of musicians who were working along similar lines at the same time (and of course many of them recorded or played with Davis).
Also in this period Davis gained a reputation for being distant, cold, and withdrawn and for having a quick temper. Among the several factors that contributed to this reputation were his contempt for the critics and specialized press and some well-publicized confrontations with the public and with fellow musicians. (One occasion, in which he had a near fight with Thelonious Monk
Thelonious Monk
Thelonious Sphere Monk was an American jazz pianist and composer considered "one of the giants of American music". Monk had a unique improvisational style and made numerous contributions to the standard jazz repertoire, including "Epistrophy", "'Round Midnight", "Blue Monk", "Straight, No Chaser"...
during the recording of Bags' Groove, received wide exposure in the specialized press.)
The "nocturnal" quality of Davis' playing and his somber reputation, along with his whispering voice, earned him the lasting moniker of "prince of darkness", adding a patina of mystery to his public persona.
First great quintet and sextet (1955–58)
Back in New York and in better health, in 1955 Davis attended the Newport Jazz FestivalNewport Jazz Festival
The Newport Jazz Festival is a music festival held every summer in Newport, Rhode Island, USA. It was established in 1954 by socialite Elaine Lorillard, who, together with husband Louis Lorillard, financed the festival for many years. The couple hired jazz impresario George Wein to organize the...
, where his performance (and especially his solo on "'Round Midnight
'Round Midnight (song)
Round Midnight" is a 1944 jazz standard by pianist Thelonious Monk. Jazz artists Cootie Williams, Dizzy Gillespie, Art Pepper, and Miles Davis have further embellished the song, with songwriter Bernie Hanighen adding lyrics...
") was greatly admired and prompted the critics to hail the "return of Miles Davis". At the same time, Davis recruited the players for a formation that became known as his "first great quintet": John Coltrane
John Coltrane
John William Coltrane was an American jazz saxophonist and composer. Working in the bebop and hard bop idioms early in his career, Coltrane helped pioneer the use of modes in jazz and later was at the forefront of free jazz...
on tenor saxophone, Red Garland
Red Garland
William "Red" Garland was an American hard bop jazz pianist whose block chord style, in part originated by Milt Buckner, influenced many forthcoming pianists in the jazz idiom.-Beginnings:...
on piano, Paul Chambers
Paul Chambers
Paul Laurence Dunbar Chambers, Jr. was a jazz bassist. A fixture of rhythm sections during the 1950s and 1960s, his importance in the development of jazz bass can be measured not only by the length and breadth of his work in this short period but also his impeccable time, intonation, and virtuosic...
on bass, and Philly Joe Jones
Philly Joe Jones
Joseph Rudolph Jones was a Philadelphia-born United States jazz drummer, known as the drummer for the Miles Davis Quintet.Philly Joe Jones was often confused with another influential jazz drummer, Jo Jones...
on drums.
None of these musicians, with the exception of Davis, had received a great deal of exposure before that time; Chambers, in particular, was very young (19 at the time), a Detroit player who had been on the New York scene for only about a year, working with the bands of Bennie Green
Bennie Green
Bennie Green was an American jazz trombonist.Born in Chicago, Illinois, Green worked in the orchestras of Earl Hines and Charlie Ventura, and recorded as bandleader through the 1950s and 1960s.-As leader:...
, Paul Quinichette
Paul Quinichette
Paul Quinichette was a jazz tenor saxophone musician. He was known as the Vice President or Vice Prez for his uncanny emulation of the breathy style of Lester Young, known as Prez. Young, who affectionately called everyone "Lady ****" , called him "Lady Q"...
, George Wallington
George Wallington
George Wallington was a highly regarded American bop pianist and composer....
, J. J. Johnson, and Kai Winding
Kai Winding
Kai Chresten Winding was a popular Danish-born American trombonist and jazz composer. He is well known for a successful collaboration with fellow trombonist J. J. Johnson.-Biography:...
. Coltrane was little known at the time, in spite of earlier collaborations with Dizzy Gillespie
Dizzy Gillespie
John Birks "Dizzy" Gillespie was an American jazz trumpet player, bandleader, singer, and composer dubbed "the sound of surprise".Together with Charlie Parker, he was a major figure in the development of bebop and modern jazz...
, Earl Bostic
Earl Bostic
Earl Bostic was an American jazz and rhythm and blues alto saxophonist, and a pioneer of the post-war American Rhythm and Blues style. He had a number of popular hits such as "Flamingo", "Harlem Nocturne", "Temptation", "Sleep", "Special Delivery Stomp", and "Where or When", which showed off his...
, and Johnny Hodges
Johnny Hodges
John Cornelius "Johnny" Hodges was an American alto saxophonist, best known for his solo work with Duke Ellington's big band. He played lead alto in the saxophone section for many years, except the period between 1932–1946 when Otto Hardwick generally played first chair...
. Davis hired Coltrane as a replacement for Sonny Rollins, after unsuccessfully trying to recruit alto saxophonist Julian "Cannonball" Adderley.
The repertoire included many bebop mainstays, standards
Jazz standard
Jazz standards are musical compositions which are an important part of the musical repertoire of jazz musicians, in that they are widely known, performed, and recorded by jazz musicians, and widely known by listeners. There is no definitive list of jazz standards, and the list of songs deemed to be...
from the Great American Songbook
Great American Songbook
The Great American Songbook is a hypothetical construct that seeks to represent the best American songs of the 20th century principally from Broadway theatre, musical theatre, and Hollywood musicals, from the 1920s to 1960, including dozens of songs of enduring popularity...
and the pre-bop era, and some traditional tunes. The prevailing style of the group was a development of the Davis experience in the previous years—Davis playing long, legato
Legato
In musical notation the Italian word legato indicates that musical notes are played or sung smoothly and connected. That is, in transitioning from note to note, there should be no intervening silence...
, and essentially melodic lines, while Coltrane, who during these years emerged as a leading figure on the musical scene, contrasted by playing high-energy solos.
With the new formation also came a new recording contract. In Newport
Newport
Newport is a city and unitary authority area in Wales. Standing on the banks of the River Usk, it is located about east of Cardiff and is the largest urban area within the historic county boundaries of Monmouthshire and the preserved county of Gwent...
, Davis had met Columbia Records
Columbia Records
Columbia Records is an American record label, owned by Japan's Sony Music Entertainment, operating under the Columbia Music Group with Aware Records. It was founded in 1888, evolving from an earlier enterprise, the American Graphophone Company — successor to the Volta Graphophone Company...
producer George Avakian
George Avakian
George Avakian is an American record producer and executive known particularly for his work with Columbia Records, and his production of albums by Miles Davis and other notable jazz musicians....
, who persuaded him to sign with his label. The quintet made its debut on record with the extremely well received 'Round About Midnight
'Round About Midnight
'Round About Midnight is an album by jazz musician Miles Davis. It was his debut on Columbia Records, and was originally released in March 1957 . The album took its name from the Thelonious Monk song 'Round Midnight"....
. Before leaving Prestige, however, Davis had to fulfill his obligations during two days of recording sessions in 1956. Prestige released these recordings in the following years as four albums: Relaxin' with the Miles Davis Quintet
Relaxin' with the Miles Davis Quintet
Relaxin' with The Miles Davis Quintet is an album recorded in 1956 by Miles Davis. Two sessions on 11 May 1956 and 26 October in the same year resulted in four albums—this one, Steamin' with The Miles Davis Quintet, Workin' with The Miles Davis Quintet and Cookin' with the Miles Davis Quintet...
, Steamin' with the Miles Davis Quintet
Steamin' with the Miles Davis Quintet
Steamin' with the Miles Davis Quintet is an album recorded in 1956 by Miles Davis. Two sessions on May 11, 1956 and October 26 in the same year resulted in four albums—this one, Relaxin' with The Miles Davis Quintet, Workin' with The Miles Davis Quintet and Cookin' with the Miles Davis Quintet...
, Workin' with the Miles Davis Quintet
Workin' with the Miles Davis Quintet
Workin' with the Miles Davis Quintet is an album recorded in 1956 by Miles Davis. Two sessions on 11 May 1956 and 26 October in the same year resulted in four albums—this one, Relaxin' with The Miles Davis Quintet, Steamin' with The Miles Davis Quintet and Cookin' with the Miles Davis Quintet...
, and Cookin' with the Miles Davis Quintet
Cookin' with the Miles Davis Quintet
Cookin' with the Miles Davis Quintet is an album recorded in 1956 by the Miles Davis Quintet. Two sessions 11 May 1956 and 26 October in the same year resulted in four albums—this one, Relaxin' with The Miles Davis Quintet, Steamin' with The Miles Davis Quintet and Workin' with The Miles Davis...
. While the recording took place in a studio, each record of this series has the structure and feel of a live performance, with several first takes on each album. The records became almost instant classics and were instrumental in establishing Davis' quintet as one of the best on the jazz scene.
The quintet was disbanded for the first time in 1957, following a series of personal problems that Davis blames on the drug addiction of the other musicians. Davis played some gigs at the Cafe Bohemia with a short-lived formation that included Sonny Rollins and drummer Art Taylor
Art Taylor
Arthur S. Taylor, Jr. was an American jazz drummer of the hard bop school.After playing in the bands of Howard McGhee, Coleman Hawkins, Buddy DeFranco, Bud Powell, and George Wallington from 1948 to 1957, he formed his own group, the Wailers...
, and then traveled to France, where he recorded the score to Louis Malle
Louis Malle
Louis Malle was a French film director, screenwriter, and producer. He worked in both French cinema and Hollywood. His films include Ascenseur pour l'échafaud , Atlantic City , and Au revoir, les enfants .- Early years in France :Malle was born into a wealthy industrialist family in Thumeries,...
's film Ascenseur pour l'échafaud
Elevator to the Gallows
Ascenseur pour l'échafaud is a 1958 French film directed by Louis Malle. It was released as Elevator to the Gallows in the USA and as Lift to the Scaffold in the UK. It stars Jeanne Moreau and Maurice Ronet as criminal lovers whose perfect crime begins to unravel when Ronet is trapped in an elevator...
. With the aid of French session musicians Barney Wilen
Barney Wilen
Barney Wilen was a French tenor and soprano saxophonist and jazz composer.Wilen was born in Nice; his father was an American dentist turned inventor, and his mother was French. He began performing in clubs in Nice after being encouraged by Blaise Cendrars who was a friend of his mother...
, Pierre Michelot
Pierre Michelot
Pierre Michelot was a French bebop and hard bop double bass player.Born in Saint-Denis, Seine-Saint-Denis, Paris, Michelot studied piano from 1936 until 1938, but switched to playing bass at the age of sixteen...
, and René Urtreger
René Urtreger
-Biography:Urtreger was born in Paris and began his piano studies at the age of four, studying privately first, and then at the Conservatory. He studied with an orientation toward jazz, playing in a small Parisian club, the "Sully d' Auteil." Conducted by Hubert Damisch, the Sully boasted an...
, and American drummer Kenny Clarke
Kenny Clarke
Kenny Clarke , born Kenneth Spearman Clarke, nicknamed "Klook" and later known as Liaqat Ali Salaam, was a jazz drummer and an early innovator of the bebop style of drumming...
, he recorded the entire soundtrack with an innovative procedure, without relying on written material: starting from sparse indication of the harmony and a general feel of a given piece, the group played by watching the movie on a screen in front of them and improvising.
Returning to New York in 1958, Davis successfully recruited Cannonball Adderley for his standing group. Coltrane, who in the meantime had freed himself from his drug habits, was available after a highly fruitful experience with Thelonious Monk and was hired back, as was Philly Joe Jones. With the quintet re-formed as a sextet, Davis recorded Milestones, an album anticipating the new directions he was preparing to give to his music.
Almost immediately after the recording of Milestones, Davis fired Garland and, shortly afterward, Jones, again for behavioral problems; he replaced them with Bill Evans
Bill Evans
William John Evans, known as Bill Evans was an American jazz pianist. His use of impressionist harmony, inventive interpretation of traditional jazz repertoire, and trademark rhythmically independent, "singing" melodic lines influenced a generation of pianists including: Chick Corea, Herbie...
——a young white pianist with a strong classical background——and drummer Jimmy Cobb
Jimmy Cobb
-External links:* - includes full discography* * * * * * *...
. With this revamped formation, Davis began a year during which the sextet performed and toured extensively and produced a record (1958 Miles, also known as 58 Sessions). Evans had a unique, impressionistic approach to the piano, and his musical ideas had a strong influence on Davis. But after only eight months on the road with the group, he was burned out and left. He was soon replaced by Wynton Kelly
Wynton Kelly
Wynton Kelly was a Jamaican-born jazz pianist, who spent his career in the United States. He is perhaps best known for working with trumpeter Miles Davis from 1959-1962.-Biography:...
, a player who brought to the sextet a swinging
Swing (jazz performance style)
In jazz and related musical styles, the term swing is used to describe the sense of propulsive rhythmic "feel" or "groove" created by the musical interaction between the performers, especially when the music creates a "visceral response" such as feet-tapping or head-nodding...
, bluesy approach that contrasted with Evans' more delicate playing.
Recordings with Gil Evans (1957–63)
In the late 1950s and early 1960s, Davis recorded a series of albums with Gil EvansGil Evans
Gil Evans was a jazz pianist, arranger, composer and bandleader, active in the United States...
, often playing flugelhorn
Flugelhorn
The flugelhorn is a brass instrument resembling a trumpet but with a wider, conical bore. Some consider it to be a member of the saxhorn family developed by Adolphe Sax ; however, other historians assert that it derives from the valve bugle designed by Michael Saurle , Munich 1832 , thus...
as well as trumpet. The first, Miles Ahead
Miles Ahead
Miles Ahead is a jazz album by Miles Davis that was released in 1957 on Columbia CL 1041. This was the first album following Birth of the Cool that Davis recorded with Gil Evans, with whom he would go on to release albums such as Porgy and Bess and Sketches of Spain...
(1957), showcased his playing with a jazz big band
Big band
A big band is a type of musical ensemble associated with jazz and the Swing Era typically consisting of rhythm, brass, and woodwind instruments totaling approximately twelve to twenty-five musicians...
and a horn section arranged by Evans. Songs included Dave Brubeck
Dave Brubeck
David Warren "Dave" Brubeck is an American jazz pianist. He has written a number of jazz standards, including "In Your Own Sweet Way" and "The Duke". Brubeck's style ranges from refined to bombastic, reflecting his mother's attempts at classical training and his improvisational skills...
's "The Duke," as well as Léo Delibes
Léo Delibes
Clément Philibert Léo Delibes was a French composer of ballets, operas, and other works for the stage...
's "The Maids of Cadiz," the first piece of European classical music Davis had recorded. Another distinctive feature of the album was the orchestral passages that Evans had devised as transitions between the different tracks, which were joined together with the innovative use of editing
Editing
Editing is the process of selecting and preparing written, visual, audible, and film media used to convey information through the processes of correction, condensation, organization, and other modifications performed with an intention of producing a correct, consistent, accurate, and complete...
in the post-production phase, turning each side of the album into a seamless piece of music.
In 1958, Davis and Evans were back in the studio to record Porgy and Bess
Porgy and Bess (Miles Davis album)
Porgy and Bess is a studio album by jazz musician Miles Davis, released in 1958 on Columbia Records. The album features arrangements by Davis and collaborator Gil Evans from George Gershwin's opera Porgy and Bess. The album was recorded in four sessions on July 22, July 29, August 4, and August 18,...
, an arrangement of pieces from George Gershwin
George Gershwin
George Gershwin was an American composer and pianist. Gershwin's compositions spanned both popular and classical genres, and his most popular melodies are widely known...
's opera of the same name
Porgy and Bess
Porgy and Bess is an opera, first performed in 1935, with music by George Gershwin, libretto by DuBose Heyward, and lyrics by Ira Gershwin and DuBose Heyward. It was based on DuBose Heyward's novel Porgy and subsequent play of the same title, which he co-wrote with his wife Dorothy Heyward...
. The lineup included three members of the sextet: Paul Chambers, Philly Joe Jones, and Julian "Cannonball" Adderley. Davis called the album one of his favorites.
Sketches of Spain
Sketches of Spain
Sketches of Spain is an album by Miles Davis, recorded between November 1959 and March 1960 at the Columbia 30th Street Studio in New York City....
(1959–1960) featured songs by contemporary Spanish composer Joaquin Rodrigo
Joaquín Rodrigo
Joaquín Rodrigo Vidre, 1st Marquis of the Gardens of Aranjuez , commonly known as Joaquín Rodrigo, was a composer of classical music and a virtuoso pianist. Despite being nearly blind from an early age, he achieved great success...
and also Manuel de Falla
Manuel de Falla
Manuel de Falla y Matheu was a Spanish Andalusian composer of classical music. With Isaac Albéniz, Enrique Granados and Joaquín Turina he is one of Spain's most important musicians of the first half of the 20th century....
, as well as Gil Evans originals with a Spanish flavor. Miles Davis at Carnegie Hall (1961) includes Rodrigo's Concierto de Aranjuez
Concierto de Aranjuez
The Concierto de Aranjuez is a composition for classical guitar and orchestra by the Spanish composer Joaquín Rodrigo. Written in 1939, it is probably Rodrigo's best-known work, and its success established his reputation as one of the most significant Spanish composers of the twentieth century. ...
, along with other compositions recorded in concert with an orchestra under Evans' direction.
Sessions with Davis and Evans in 1962 resulted in the album Quiet Nights
Quiet Nights (Miles Davis and Gil Evans album)
-Personnel:* Miles Davis — trumpet* Gil Evans — arranger, conductor* Shorty Baker, Bernie Glow, Louis Mucci, Ernie Royal — trumpets* J.J. Johnson, Frank Rehak — trombones* Ray Alonge, Don Corrado, Julius Watkins — french horns* Bill Barber — tuba...
, a short collection of bossa nova
Bossa nova
Bossa nova is a style of Brazilian music. Bossa nova acquired a large following in the 1960s, initially consisting of young musicians and college students...
s that was released against the wishes of both artists: Evans stated it was only half an album, and blamed the record company; Davis blamed producer Teo Macero, whom he didn't speak to for more than two years. This was the last time Evans and Davis made a full album together; despite the professional separation, however, Davis noted later that "my best friend is Gil Evans."
Kind of Blue (1959–64)
In March and April 1959, Davis re-entered the studio with his working sextet to record what is widely considered his magnum opusMasterpiece
Masterpiece in modern usage refers to a creation that has been given much critical praise, especially one that is considered the greatest work of a person's career or to a work of outstanding creativity, skill or workmanship....
, Kind of Blue
Kind of Blue
Kind of Blue is a studio album by American jazz musician Miles Davis, released August 17, 1959, on Columbia Records in the United States. Recording sessions for the album took place at Columbia's 30th Street Studio in New York City on March 2 and April 22, 1959...
. He called back Bill Evans, months away from forming what would become his own seminal trio, for the album sessions, as the music had been planned around Evans' piano style. Both Davis and Evans were personally acquainted with the ideas of pianist George Russell regarding modal jazz
Modal jazz
Modal jazz is jazz that uses musical modes rather than chord progressions as a harmonic framework. Originating in the late 1950s and 1960s, modal jazz is characterized by Miles Davis's "Milestones" Kind of Blue and John Coltrane's classic quartet from 1960–64. Other important performers include...
, Davis from discussions with Russell and others before the Birth of the Cool
Birth of the Cool
Birth of the Cool is a compilation album by American jazz musician Miles Davis, released in 1957 on Capitol Records. It compiles twelve songs recorded by Davis's nonet for the label over the course of three sessions during 1949 and 1950...
sessions, and Evans from study with Russell in 1956. Davis, however, had neglected to inform current pianist Kelly of Evans' role in the recordings; Kelly subsequently played only on the track "Freddie Freeloader
Freddie Freeloader
"Freddie Freeloader" is a composition by Miles Davis and is the second track on his album Kind of Blue. The piece takes the form of a twelve-bar blues in B-flat, but the chord over the final two bars of each chorus is an A-flat7, not the traditional B-flat7 followed by either F7 for a turnaround or...
" and was not present at the April dates for the album. "So What" and "All Blues
All Blues
"All Blues" is a jazz composition by Miles Davis first appearing on the influential 1959 album Kind of Blue.It is a 12 bar blues in 6/4; the chord sequence is that of a basic blues and made up entirely of 7th chords, with a ♭VI in the turnaround instead of just the usual V chord...
" had been played by the sextet at performances prior to the recording sessions, but for the other three compositions, Davis and Evans prepared skeletal harmonic frameworks that the other musicians saw for the first time on the day of recording, to allow a fresher approach to their improvisation
Improvisation
Improvisation is the practice of acting, singing, talking and reacting, of making and creating, in the moment and in response to the stimulus of one's immediate environment and inner feelings. This can result in the invention of new thought patterns, new practices, new structures or symbols, and/or...
s. The resulting album has proven to be both highly popular and enormously influential. According to the RIAA, Kind of Blue is the best-selling jazz album of all time, having been certified as quadruple platinum (4 million copies sold). In December 2009, the US House of Representatives voted 409–0 to pass a resolution honoring the album as a national treasure.
The trumpet Davis used on the recording is currently displayed in the music building on the campus of the University of North Carolina at Greensboro
University of North Carolina at Greensboro
The University of North Carolina at Greensboro , also known as UNC Greensboro, is a public university in Greensboro, North Carolina, United States and is a constituent institution of the University of North Carolina system. The university offers more than 100 undergraduate, 61 master's and 26...
. It was donated to the school by Arthur "Buddy" Gist, who met Davis in 1949 and became a close friend. The gift was the reason why the jazz program at UNCG is named the "Miles Davis Jazz Studies Program."
In 1959, the Miles Davis Quintet
Miles Davis Quintet
The Miles Davis Quintet was an American jazz band from 1955 to early 1969 led by Miles Davis. The quintet underwent frequent personnel changes toward its metamorphosis into a different ensemble in 1969...
was appearing at the famous Birdland
Birdland (jazz club)
Birdland is a jazz club started in New York City on December 15, 1949. The original Birdland, which was located at 1678 Broadway, just north of West 52nd Street in Manhattan, was closed in 1965 due to increased rents, but it re-opened for one night in 1979...
nightclub in New York City. After finishing a 27 minute recording for the armed services
United States armed forces
The United States Armed Forces are the military forces of the United States. They consist of the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, and Coast Guard.The United States has a strong tradition of civilian control of the military...
, Davis took a break outside the club. As he was escorting an attractive blonde woman across the sidewalk to a taxi, Davis was told by Patrolman Gerald Kilduff to "move on." Davis explained that he worked at the nightclub and refused to move. The officer said that he would arrest Davis and grabbed him as Davis protected himself. Witnesses said that Kilduff punched Davis in the stomach with his nightstick without provocation. Two nearby detectives held the crowd back as a third detective, Don Rolker, approached Davis from behind and beat him about the head. Davis was then arrested and taken to jail where he was charged with feloniously assaulting an officer. He was then taken to St. Clary Hospital where he received five stitches for a wound on his head. Davis attempted to pursue the case in the courts, before eventually dropping the proceedings in a plea bargain
Plea bargain
A plea bargain is an agreement in a criminal case whereby the prosecutor offers the defendant the opportunity to plead guilty, usually to a lesser charge or to the original criminal charge with a recommendation of a lighter than the maximum sentence.A plea bargain allows criminal defendants to...
in order to recover his suspended Cabaret Card, enabling him to return to work in New York clubs.
Davis persuaded Coltrane to play with the group on one final European tour in the spring of 1960. Coltrane then departed to form his classic quartet, although he returned for some of the tracks on Davis' 1961 album Someday My Prince Will Come. After Coltrane, Davis tried various saxophonists, including Jimmy Heath
Jimmy Heath
James Edward Heath , nicknamed Little Bird, is an American jazz saxophonist, composer and arranger. He is the brother of bassist Percy Heath and drummer Albert Heath.-Biography:...
, Sonny Stitt
Sonny Stitt
Edward "Sonny" Stitt was an American jazz saxophonist of the bebop/hard bop idiom. He was also one of the best-documented saxophonists of his generation, recording over 100 albums in his lifetime...
, and Hank Mobley
Hank Mobley
Henry Mobley was an American hard bop and soul jazz tenor saxophonist and composer. Mobley was described by Leonard Feather as the "middleweight champion of the tenor saxophone", a metaphor used to describe his tone that was neither as aggressive as John Coltrane nor as mellow as Stan Getz...
. The quintet with Hank Mobley was recorded in the studio and on several live engagements at Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States, located at 881 Seventh Avenue, occupying the east stretch of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street and West 57th Street, two blocks south of Central Park....
and the Black Hawk jazz club
Black Hawk (nightclub)
The Black Hawk was a San Francisco nightclub which featured live jazz performances during its period of operation from 1949 to 1963. It was located on the corner of Turk Street and Hyde Street in San Francisco's Tenderloin District. Guido Caccienti owned the club along with Johnny and Helen...
in San Francisco. Stitt's playing with the group is found on a recording made in Olympia
Paris Olympia
The Olympia is a music hall in the 9th arrondissement of Paris. Located at No. 28, Boulevard des Capucines, its closest métro/RER stations are Madeleine, Opéra, Havre – Caumartin and Auber....
, Paris (where Davis and Coltrane had played a few months before) and the Live in Stockholm album.
In 1963, Davis' longtime rhythm section of Kelly, Chambers, and Cobb departed. He quickly got to work putting together a new group, including tenor saxophonist
Tenor saxophone
The tenor saxophone is a medium-sized member of the saxophone family, a group of instruments invented by Adolphe Sax in the 1840s. The tenor, with the alto, are the two most common types of saxophones. The tenor is pitched in the key of B, and written as a transposing instrument in the treble...
George Coleman
George Coleman
George Edward Coleman is an American hard bop saxophonist, bandleader, and composer, known chiefly for his work with Miles Davis and Herbie Hancock in the 1960s.-Biography:...
and bassist Ron Carter
Ron Carter
Ron Carter is an American jazz double-bassist. His appearances on over 2,500 albums make him one of the most-recorded bassists in jazz history, along with Milt Hinton, Ray Brown and Leroy Vinnegar. Carter is also an acclaimed cellist who has recorded numerous times on that...
. Davis, Coleman, Carter and a few other musicians recorded half the tracks for an album in the spring of 1963. A few weeks later, seventeen-year-old drummer Tony Williams and pianist Herbie Hancock
Herbie Hancock
Herbert Jeffrey "Herbie" Hancock is an American pianist, bandleader and composer. As part of Miles Davis's "second great quintet," Hancock helped to redefine the role of a jazz rhythm section and was one of the primary architects of the "post-bop" sound...
joined the group, and soon afterward Davis, Coleman, and the new rhythm section recorded the rest of Seven Steps to Heaven
Seven Steps to Heaven (album)
-Side two:-2005 reissue bonus tracks:-Personnel:*Miles Davis — trumpet*George Coleman — tenor saxophone on "Seven Steps to Heaven," "So Near So Far," "Joshua"...
.
The rhythm players melded together quickly as a section and with the horns. The group's rapid evolution can be traced through the Seven Steps to Heaven album, In Europe (July 1963), My Funny Valentine
My Funny Valentine (album)
My Funny Valentine: Miles Davis in Concert is a 1965 live album by Miles Davis. It was recorded at a concert at the Philharmonic Hall of Lincoln Center, New York City, NY, on February 12, 1964....
(February 1964), and Four and More (also February 1964). The quintet played essentially the same repertoire of bebop tunes and standards that earlier Davis bands had played, but they tackled them with increasing structural and rhythmic freedom and, in the case of the up-tempo material, breakneck speed.
Coleman left in the spring of 1964, to be replaced by avant-garde
Avant-garde
Avant-garde means "advance guard" or "vanguard". The adjective form is used in English to refer to people or works that are experimental or innovative, particularly with respect to art, culture, and politics....
saxophonist Sam Rivers
Sam Rivers
Samuel Carthorne Rivers , is an American jazz musician and composer. He performs on soprano and tenor saxophones, bass clarinet, flute, harmonica and piano....
, on the suggestion of Tony Williams. Rivers remained in the group only briefly, but was recorded live with the quintet in Japan; this configuration can be heard on Miles in Tokyo! (July 1964).
By the end of the summer, Davis had persuaded Wayne Shorter
Wayne Shorter
Wayne Shorter is an American jazz saxophonist and composer.He is generally acknowledged to be jazz's greatest living composer, and many of his compositions have become standards...
to leave Art Blakey
Art Blakey
Arthur "Art" Blakey , known later as Abdullah Ibn Buhaina, was an American Grammy Award-winning jazz drummer and bandleader. He was a member of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community....
's Jazz Messengers and join the quintet. Shorter became the group's principal composer, and some of his compositions of this era (including "Footprints" and "Nefertiti") have become standards
Jazz standard
Jazz standards are musical compositions which are an important part of the musical repertoire of jazz musicians, in that they are widely known, performed, and recorded by jazz musicians, and widely known by listeners. There is no definitive list of jazz standards, and the list of songs deemed to be...
. While on tour in Europe, the group quickly made their first official recording, Miles in Berlin (September 1964). On returning to the United States later that year, ever the musical entrepreneur, Davis (at Jackie DeShannon
Jackie DeShannon
Jackie DeShannon is an American singer-songwriter with a string of hit song credits from the 1960s onwards. She was one of the first female singer-songwriters of the rock 'n' roll period.- Life and early career :...
's urging) was instrumental in getting The Byrds
The Byrds
The Byrds were an American rock band, formed in Los Angeles, California in 1964. The band underwent multiple line-up changes throughout its existence, with frontman Roger McGuinn remaining the sole consistent member until the group disbanded in 1973...
signed to Columbia Records
Columbia Records
Columbia Records is an American record label, owned by Japan's Sony Music Entertainment, operating under the Columbia Music Group with Aware Records. It was founded in 1888, evolving from an earlier enterprise, the American Graphophone Company — successor to the Volta Graphophone Company...
.
Second great quintet (1964–68)
By the time of E.S.P.
E.S.P. (Miles Davis album)
Recorded in January 1965, E.S.P. is the first album by what is often referred to as Miles Davis's second great quintet. The quintet comprising Davis, Wayne Shorter, Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter and Tony Williams would be the most long-lived of all Davis's groups, and this was their first studio...
(1965), Davis' lineup consisted of Wayne Shorter
Wayne Shorter
Wayne Shorter is an American jazz saxophonist and composer.He is generally acknowledged to be jazz's greatest living composer, and many of his compositions have become standards...
, Herbie Hancock
Herbie Hancock
Herbert Jeffrey "Herbie" Hancock is an American pianist, bandleader and composer. As part of Miles Davis's "second great quintet," Hancock helped to redefine the role of a jazz rhythm section and was one of the primary architects of the "post-bop" sound...
(piano), Ron Carter
Ron Carter
Ron Carter is an American jazz double-bassist. His appearances on over 2,500 albums make him one of the most-recorded bassists in jazz history, along with Milt Hinton, Ray Brown and Leroy Vinnegar. Carter is also an acclaimed cellist who has recorded numerous times on that...
(bass), and Tony Williams (drums). The last of his acoustic bands, this group is often referred to as the second great quintet.
A two-night Chicago performance in late 1965 is captured on The Complete Live at the Plugged Nickel 1965
The Complete Live at The Plugged Nickel 1965
- Disc two-a :Second Set December 22, 1965 - Disc two-b :Second Set December 22, 1965 - Disc three :Third Set December 22, 1965 - Disc four :First Set December 23, 1965 - Disc five :...
, released in 1995. Unlike their studio albums, the live engagement shows the group still playing primarily standards and bebop tunes. It is reasonable to point out, though, that while some of the titles remain the same as the tunes employed by the 1950s quintet, the speed and distance of departure from the framework of the standards bears no comparison. It could even be said that the listening experience to these standards as live performances is as much of a radical take on the jazz of the time as the new compositions of the studio albums listed below.
The recording of Live at the Plugged Nickel was not issued anywhere in the 1960s, first appearing as a Japan-only partial issue in the late 1970s, then as a double-LP in the USA and Europe in 1982. It was followed by a series of studio recordings: Miles Smiles (1966), Sorcerer (1967), Nefertiti (1967), Miles in the Sky
Miles in the Sky (album)
Miles in the Sky is an album recorded in January and two dates in May 1968. It is the fifth and final album fully made by the Miles Davis second great quintet, for by the time of Filles de Kilimanjaro, the quintet was beginning to dissolve, with Ron Carter and Herbie Hancock being replaced on two...
(1968), and Filles de Kilimanjaro
Filles de Kilimanjaro
is a studio album by American jazz recording artist Miles Davis. It was recorded in June and September 1968...
(1968). The quintet's approach to improvisation came to be known as "time no changes" or "freebop," because they abandoned the more conventional chord-change
Chord progression
A chord progression is a series of musical chords, or chord changes that "aims for a definite goal" of establishing a tonality founded on a key, root or tonic chord. In other words, the succession of root relationships...
-based approach of bebop for a modal approach. Through Nefertiti, the studio recordings consisted primarily of originals composed by Shorter, with occasional compositions by the other sidemen. In 1967, the group began to play their live concerts in continuous sets, each tune flowing into the next, with only the melody indicating any sort of demarcation. Davis's bands would continue to perform in this way until his retirement in 1975.
Miles in the Sky and Filles de Kilimanjaro, on which electric bass, electric piano, and electric guitar were tentatively introduced on some tracks, pointed the way to the subsequent fusion
Jazz fusion
Jazz fusion is a musical fusion genre that developed from mixing funk and R&B rhythms and the amplification and electronic effects of rock, complex time signatures derived from non-Western music and extended, typically instrumental compositions with a jazz approach to lengthy group improvisations,...
phase of Davis' career. Davis also began experimenting with more rock-oriented rhythms on these records. By the time the second half of Filles de Kilimanjaro had been recorded, bassist Dave Holland
Dave Holland
Dave Holland is an English jazz double bassist, composer and bandleader who has been performing and recording for five decades. He has lived in the United States for 40 years....
and pianist Chick Corea
Chick Corea
Armando Anthony "Chick" Corea is an American jazz pianist, keyboardist, and composer.Many of his compositions are considered jazz standards. As a member of Miles Davis' band in the 1960s, he participated in the birth of the electric jazz fusion movement. In the 1970s he formed Return to Forever...
had replaced Carter and Hancock in the working band, though both Carter and Hancock would occasionally contribute to future recording sessions. Davis soon began to take over the compositional duties of his sidemen.
Electric Miles (1968–75)
Davis' influences included 1960s acid rockPsychedelic rock
Psychedelic rock is a style of rock music that is inspired or influenced by psychedelic culture and attempts to replicate and enhance the mind-altering experiences of psychedelic drugs. It emerged during the mid 1960s among folk rock and blues rock bands in United States and the United Kingdom...
and funk
Funk
Funk is a music genre that originated in the mid-late 1960s when African American musicians blended soul music, jazz and R&B into a rhythmic, danceable new form of music. Funk de-emphasizes melody and harmony and brings a strong rhythmic groove of electric bass and drums to the foreground...
artists such as Sly and the Family Stone, James Brown, and Jimi Hendrix
Jimi Hendrix
James Marshall "Jimi" Hendrix was an American guitarist and singer-songwriter...
, many of whom he met through Betty Mabry
Betty Davis
Betty Davis is an American funk, rock and soul singer. She was also Miles Davis's second wife.- Background :She worked as a model, appearing in photo spreads in Seventeen, Ebony and Glamour...
(later Betty Davis), a young model and songwriter Davis married in September 1968 and divorced a year later. The musical transition required that Davis and his band adapt to electric instrument
Electric instrument
An electric musical instrument is one in which the use of electric devices determines or affects the sound produced by an instrument. It is also known as an amplified musical instrument due to the common utilization of an electronic instrument amplifier to project the intended sound as determined...
s in both live performances and the studio. By the time In a Silent Way
In a Silent Way
In a Silent Way is a studio album by American jazz musician Miles Davis, released July 30, 1969 on Columbia Records. Produced by Teo Macero, the album was recorded in one session date on February 18, 1969 at CBS 30th Street Studio B in New York City. Incorporating elements of classical sonata form,...
had been recorded in February 1969, Davis had augmented his quintet with additional players. At various times Hancock or Joe Zawinul
Joe Zawinul
Josef Erich Zawinul was an Austrian-American jazz keyboardist and composer.First coming to prominence with saxophonist Cannonball Adderley, Zawinul went on to play with trumpeter Miles Davis, and to become one of the creators of jazz fusion, an innovative musical genre that combined jazz with...
was brought in to join Corea on electric keyboards
Electronic keyboard
An electronic keyboard is an electronic or digital keyboard instrument.The major components of a typical modern electronic keyboard are:...
, and guitarist John McLaughlin
John McLaughlin (musician)
John McLaughlin , also known as Mahavishnu John McLaughlin, is an English guitarist, bandleader and composer...
made the first of his many appearances with Davis. By this point, Shorter was also doubling on soprano saxophone. After recording this album, Williams left to form his group Lifetime and was replaced by Jack DeJohnette
Jack DeJohnette
Jack DeJohnette is an American jazz drummer, pianist, and composer. He is one of the most influential jazz drummers of the 20th century, due to extensive work as leader and sideman for musicians like Miles Davis, Joe Henderson, Freddie Hubbard, Keith Jarrett and Sonny...
.
Six months later an even larger group of musicians, including Jack DeJohnette
Jack DeJohnette
Jack DeJohnette is an American jazz drummer, pianist, and composer. He is one of the most influential jazz drummers of the 20th century, due to extensive work as leader and sideman for musicians like Miles Davis, Joe Henderson, Freddie Hubbard, Keith Jarrett and Sonny...
, Airto Moreira
Airto Moreira
Airto Moreira is a Brazilian jazz drummer and percussionist. Airto is married to jazz singer Flora Purim, and their daughter Diana Moreira is also a singer. He currently resides in Los Angeles.-Biography:...
, and Bennie Maupin
Bennie Maupin
Bennie Maupin is a Detroit Michigan jazz multireedist. He performs on various saxophones, flute and bass clarinet.He is probably best known for his participation in Herbie Hancock's Mwandishi sextet and Headhunters band, and for performing on Miles Davis's seminal fusion record, Bitches Brew...
, recorded the double LP Bitches Brew
Bitches Brew
Bitches Brew is a studio double album by jazz musician Miles Davis, released in April 1970 on Columbia Records. The album continued his experimentation with electric instruments previously featured on his critically acclaimed In a Silent Way album...
, which became a huge seller, reaching gold status by 1976. This album and In a Silent Way were among the first fusions of jazz and rock that were commercially successful, building on the groundwork laid by Charles Lloyd, Larry Coryell, and others who pioneered a genre that would become known as jazz-rock fusion. During this period, Davis toured with Shorter, Corea, Holland, and DeJohnette. The group's repertoire included material from Bitches Brew, In a Silent Way, and the 1960s quintet albums, along with an occasional standard.
In 1972, Davis was introduced to the music of Karlheinz Stockhausen
Karlheinz Stockhausen
Karlheinz Stockhausen was a German composer, widely acknowledged by critics as one of the most important but also controversial composers of the 20th and early 21st centuries. Another critic calls him "one of the great visionaries of 20th-century music"...
by Paul Buckmaster
Paul Buckmaster
Paul John Buckmaster is a Grammy Award-winning English artist, arranger and composer.He began learning the cello at the age of 4 and graduated from the Royal College of Music at age 16....
, leading to a period of new creative exploration. Biographer J. K. Chambers wrote that "the effect of Davis' study of Stockhausen could not be repressed for long... Davis' own 'space music' shows Stockhausen's influence compositionally." His recordings and performances during this period were described as "space music" by fans, by music critic Leonard Feather
Leonard Feather
Leonard Geoffrey Feather was a British-born jazz pianist, composer, and producer who was best known for his music journalism and other writing.-Biography:...
, and by Buckmaster, who described it as "a lot of mood changes—heavy, dark, intense—definitely space music." Both Bitches Brew
Bitches Brew
Bitches Brew is a studio double album by jazz musician Miles Davis, released in April 1970 on Columbia Records. The album continued his experimentation with electric instruments previously featured on his critically acclaimed In a Silent Way album...
and In a Silent Way
In a Silent Way
In a Silent Way is a studio album by American jazz musician Miles Davis, released July 30, 1969 on Columbia Records. Produced by Teo Macero, the album was recorded in one session date on February 18, 1969 at CBS 30th Street Studio B in New York City. Incorporating elements of classical sonata form,...
feature "extended" (more than 20 minutes each) compositions that were never actually "played straight through" by the musicians in the studio. Instead, Davis and producer Teo Macero
Teo Macero
Teo Macero , born Attilio Joseph Macero, was an American jazz saxophonist, composer, and record producer...
selected musical motifs
Motif (music)
In music, a motif or motive is a short musical idea, a salient recurring figure, musical fragment or succession of notes that has some special importance in or is characteristic of a composition....
of various lengths from recorded extended improvisations and edited them together into a musical whole that exists only in the recorded version. Bitches Brew
Bitches Brew
Bitches Brew is a studio double album by jazz musician Miles Davis, released in April 1970 on Columbia Records. The album continued his experimentation with electric instruments previously featured on his critically acclaimed In a Silent Way album...
made use of such electronic effects as multi-tracking
Multitrack recording
Multitrack recording is a method of sound recording that allows for the separate recording of multiple sound sources to create a cohesive whole...
, tape loop
Tape loop
In music, tape loops are loops of prerecorded magnetic tape used to create repetitive, rhythmic musical patterns or dense layers of sound. Contemporary composers such as Steve Reich and Karlheinz Stockhausen used tape loops to create phase patterns and rhythms...
s, and other editing techniques. Both records, especially Bitches Brew, proved to be big sellers. Starting with Bitches Brew, Davis' albums began to often feature cover art
Cover art
Cover art is the illustration or photograph on the outside of a published product such as a book , magazine, comic book, video game , DVD, CD, videotape, or music album. The art has a primarily commercial function, i.e...
much more in line with psychedelic
Psychedelic
The term psychedelic is derived from the Greek words ψυχή and δηλοῦν , translating to "soul-manifesting". A psychedelic experience is characterized by the striking perception of aspects of one's mind previously unknown, or by the creative exuberance of the mind liberated from its ostensibly...
art or black power
Black Power
Black Power is a political slogan and a name for various associated ideologies. It is used in the movement among people of Black African descent throughout the world, though primarily by African Americans in the United States...
movements than that of his earlier albums. He took significant cuts in his usual performing fees in order to open for rock groups like the Steve Miller Band
Steve Miller Band
The Steve Miller Band is an American rock band formed in 1967 in San Francisco, California. The band is managed by Steve Miller on guitar and lead vocals, and is known for a string of mid-1970s hit singles that are staples of the classic rock radio format.-History:In 1965, Steve Miller and...
, the Grateful Dead
Grateful Dead
The Grateful Dead was an American rock band formed in 1965 in the San Francisco Bay Area. The band was known for its unique and eclectic style, which fused elements of rock, folk, bluegrass, blues, reggae, country, improvisational jazz, psychedelia, and space rock, and for live performances of long...
, Neil Young
Neil Young
Neil Percival Young, OC, OM is a Canadian singer-songwriter who is widely regarded as one of the most influential musicians of his generation...
, and Santana
Carlos Santana
Carlos Augusto Alves Santana is a Mexican rock guitarist. Santana became famous in the late 1960s and early 1970s with his band, Santana, which pioneered rock, salsa and jazz fusion...
. Several live albums were recorded during the early 1970s at these performances: Live at the Fillmore East, March 7, 1970: It's About That Time
Live at the Fillmore East, March 7, 1970: It's About That Time
Live at the Fillmore East March 7, 1970: It's About that Time is a live double album by Miles Davis. Sony Music Entertainment released the album in 2001, although the concert had previously circulated as a bootleg recording...
(March 1970), Black Beauty
Black Beauty: Live at the Fillmore West
Black Beauty: Miles Davis at Fillmore West is a live album by American jazz recording artist Miles Davis, recorded on April 10, 1970 at the Fillmore West in San Francisco...
(April 1970), and Miles Davis at Fillmore: Live at the Fillmore East
Miles Davis at Fillmore: Live at the Fillmore East
At Fillmore is a 1970 live album by jazz trumpeter Miles Davis and band, recorded at the Fillmore East, New York City on four consecutive days, June 17 through June 20, 1970, originally released as a double vinyl LP.The live performances were heavily edited by...
(June 1970).
By the time of Live-Evil in December 1970, Davis' ensemble had transformed into a much more funk-oriented group. Davis began experimenting with wah-wah effects on his horn. The ensemble with Gary Bartz
Gary Bartz
Gary Bartz is an American alto and soprano saxophonist and clarinetist.Bartz graduated from the Baltimore City College high school and The Juilliard School...
, Keith Jarrett
Keith Jarrett
Keith Jarrett is an American pianist and composer who performs both jazz and classical music.Jarrett started his career with Art Blakey, moving on to play with Charles Lloyd and Miles Davis. Since the early 1970s he has enjoyed a great deal of success in jazz, jazz fusion, and classical music; as...
, and Michael Henderson
Michael Henderson
Michael Henderson is an American bass guitarist and vocalist best known for his bass playing with Miles Davis in the early 1970s, on early fusion albums such as A Tribute to Jack Johnson, Pangaea, and Live-Evil.- Biography :He was one of the first notable bass guitarists of the fusion era as well...
, often referred to as the "Cellar Door band" (the live portions of Live-Evil were recorded at a Washington, DC, club by that name
The Cellar Door
The Cellar Door was a music club at 34th and M Street NW in Washington, D.C. from 1965 through 1981. It emerged from The Shadows, Georgetown, Washington, D.C. It was one of the premier music spots in Washington and was the genesis as well as a tryout for larger markets...
), never recorded in the studio, but is documented in the six-CD box set The Cellar Door Sessions, which was recorded over four nights in December 1970. In 1970, Davis contributed extensively to the soundtrack of a documentary
Jack Johnson (film)
Jack Johnson is a 1970 documentary film directed by Jim Jacobs about the boxer Jack Johnson. It was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature....
about the African-American boxer heavyweight champion Jack Johnson
Jack Johnson (boxer)
John Arthur Johnson , nicknamed the “Galveston Giant,” was an American boxer. At the height of the Jim Crow era, Johnson became the first African American world heavyweight boxing champion...
. Himself a devotee of boxing, Davis drew parallels between Johnson, whose career had been defined by the fruitless search for a Great White Hope to dethrone him, and Davis' own career, in which he felt the musical establishment of the time had prevented him from receiving the acclaim and rewards that were due him. The resulting album, 1971's A Tribute to Jack Johnson
A Tribute to Jack Johnson
A Tribute to Jack Johnson is a studio album by American jazz musician Miles Davis, released February 24, 1971 on Columbia Records. It also serves as the soundtrack for a documentary by Bill Cayton about the heavyweight world champion boxer Jack Johnson....
, contained two long pieces that featured musicians (some of whom were not credited on the record) including guitarists John McLaughlin
John McLaughlin (musician)
John McLaughlin , also known as Mahavishnu John McLaughlin, is an English guitarist, bandleader and composer...
and Sonny Sharrock
Sonny Sharrock
Warren Harding "Sonny" Sharrock was an American jazz guitarist. He was once married to singer Linda Sharrock, with whom he sometimes recorded and performed....
, Herbie Hancock
Herbie Hancock
Herbert Jeffrey "Herbie" Hancock is an American pianist, bandleader and composer. As part of Miles Davis's "second great quintet," Hancock helped to redefine the role of a jazz rhythm section and was one of the primary architects of the "post-bop" sound...
on a Farfisa
Farfisa
Farfisa is a manufacturer of electronics based in Osimo, Italy.The Farfisa brand name is commonly associated with a series of compact electronic organs, and later, a series of multi-timbral synthesizers. At the height of its production, Farfisa operated three factories to produce instruments, in...
organ, and drummer Billy Cobham
Billy Cobham
William C. Cobham is a Panamanian American jazz drummer, composer and bandleader, who has called Switzerland home since the late 1970s....
. McLaughlin and Cobham went on to become founding members of the Mahavishnu Orchestra in 1971.
As Davis stated in his autobiography, he wanted to make music for the young African-American audience. On the Corner
On the Corner
On the Corner is a studio album by jazz musician Miles Davis, recorded in June and July 1972 and released later that year on Columbia Records. It was scorned by critics at the time of its release and was one of Davis's worst-selling recordings...
(1972) blended funk elements with the traditional jazz styles he had played his entire career. The album was highlighted by the appearance of saxophonist Carlos Garnett
Carlos Garnett
Carlos Garnett is a Panamanian-American jazz saxophonist, composer, arranger, and jazz group leader.Garnett was born on December 1, 1938, in Red Tank, Panama Canal Zone. He became interested in jazz music after hearing Louis Jordan's and James Moody's music in film shorts...
. Critics were not kind to the album; in his autobiography, Davis stated that critics could not figure out how to categorize it, and he complained that the album was not promoted by the "traditional" jazz radio stations. After recording On the Corner, Davis put together a new group, with only Michael Henderson
Michael Henderson
Michael Henderson is an American bass guitarist and vocalist best known for his bass playing with Miles Davis in the early 1970s, on early fusion albums such as A Tribute to Jack Johnson, Pangaea, and Live-Evil.- Biography :He was one of the first notable bass guitarists of the fusion era as well...
, Carlos Garnett
Carlos Garnett
Carlos Garnett is a Panamanian-American jazz saxophonist, composer, arranger, and jazz group leader.Garnett was born on December 1, 1938, in Red Tank, Panama Canal Zone. He became interested in jazz music after hearing Louis Jordan's and James Moody's music in film shorts...
, and percussionist Mtume
Mtume
Mtume was a funk and soul group that had several R&B hits in the 1980s. Its founder, percussionist James Mtume, previously played with Miles Davis in the 1970s. Other members of the group included Reggie Lucas and Tawatha Agee.-History:...
returning from the previous band. It included guitarist Reggie Lucas
Reggie Lucas
Reginald "Reggie" Lucas is an American musician, songwriter and record producer. Lucas is most famous for his production work with percussionist Mtume and for producing the majority of Madonna's 1983 self-titled debut album.-Biography:...
, tabla player Badal Roy
Badal Roy
Badal Roy is a tabla player, percussionist, and recording artist known for his work in jazz, world music, and experimental music.-Biography:...
, sitarist Khalil Balakrishna, and drummer Al Foster
Al Foster
Al Foster is an American jazz drummer. Foster played with Miles Davis's large funk fusion group in the 70s, was one of the few people to have contact with Miles during his retirement, and was also part of his comeback album The Man With the Horn of 1981...
. It was unusual in that none of the sidemen were major jazz instrumentalists; as a result, the music emphasized rhythmic density and shifting textures instead of individual solos. This group, which recorded in the Philharmonic Hall
Avery Fisher Hall
Avery Fisher Hall is a concert hall, in New York City and is part of the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts complex. It is the home of the New York Philharmonic, with a capacity of 2,738 seats.-History:...
for the album In Concert
In Concert: Live at Philharmonic Hall
In Concert: Live at Philharmonic Hall is a double album recorded by American jazz musician Miles Davis.It was recorded live at Philharmonic Hall, New York, New York on September 29, 1972, and originally released without track or personnel listings...
(1972), was unsatisfactory to Davis. Through the first half of 1973, he dropped the tabla
Tabla
The tabla is a popular Indian percussion instrument used in Hindustani classical music and in popular and devotional music of the Indian subcontinent. The instrument consists of a pair of hand drums of contrasting sizes and timbres...
and sitar
Sitar
The 'Tablaman' is a plucked stringed instrument predominantly used in Hindustani classical music, where it has been ubiquitous since the Middle Ages...
, took over keyboard duties, and added guitarist Pete Cosey
Pete Cosey
Pete Cosey is an African-American guitarist most famous for playing with Miles Davis' band between 1973 and 1975. His fiercely flanged and distorted guitar bore comparisons to Jimi Hendrix...
. The Davis/Cosey/Lucas/Henderson/Mtume/Foster ensemble would remain virtually intact over the next two years. Initially, Dave Liebman
Dave Liebman
Dave Liebman is an American saxophonist and flautist. In June 2010, he received a NEA Jazz Masters lifetime achievement award from the National Endowment for the Arts.-Biography:...
played saxophones and flute with the band; in 1974, he was replaced by Sonny Fortune
Sonny Fortune
Sonny Fortune is an American jazz alto saxophonist and flautist. He also plays soprano saxophone, tenor saxophone, baritone saxophone and clarinet.-Biography:...
.
Big Fun (1974) was a double album containing four long improvisations, recorded between 1969 and 1972. Similarly, Get Up With It
Get Up with It
Get Up with It is an album collecting tracks recorded between 1970 and 1974 by Miles Davis. Released on November 22, 1974 as a double LP, it was Davis' last studio album before five years of retirement from music....
(1974) collected recordings from the previous five years. Get Up With It included "He Loved Him Madly", a tribute to Duke Ellington, as well as one of Davis' most lauded pieces from this era, "Calypso Frelimo". It was his last studio album of the 1970s. In 1974 and 1975, Columbia recorded three double-LP live Davis albums: Dark Magus
Dark Magus
Dark Magus is a live album by jazz artist Miles Davis recorded at Carnegie Hall in New York City on March 30, 1974. The album was released in 1977 in Japan as a double-LP by Columbia Records, and released in 1997 in the United States in a double-CD format...
, Agharta
Agharta (album)
Agharta is an album recorded by jazz trumpeter Miles Davis in 1975. Both Agharta and Pangaea were recorded on the same day in Osaka, Japan...
, and Pangaea
Pangaea (album)
Pangaea is a double album recorded by jazz trumpeter Miles Davis in 1975. Both Pangaea and Agharta were recorded on the same day in Osaka, Japan...
. Dark Magus captures a 1974 New York concert; the latter two are recordings of consecutive concerts from the same February 1975 day in Osaka
Osaka
is a city in the Kansai region of Japan's main island of Honshu, a designated city under the Local Autonomy Law, the capital city of Osaka Prefecture and also the biggest part of Keihanshin area, which is represented by three major cities of Japan, Kyoto, Osaka and Kobe...
. At the time, only Agharta was available in the US; Pangaea and Dark Magus were initially released only by CBS/Sony Japan. All three feature at least two electric guitarists (Reggie Lucas and Pete Cosey, deploying an array of Hendrix-inspired electronic distortion devices; Dominique Gaumont is a third guitarist on Dark Magus), electric bass, drums, reeds, and Davis on electric trumpet and organ. These albums were the last he was to record for five years. Davis was troubled by osteoarthritis (which led to a hip replacement operation in 1976, the first of several), sickle-cell anemia, depression, bursitis
Bursitis
Bursitis is the inflammation of one or more bursae of synovial fluid in the body. The bursae rest at the points where internal functionaries, such as muscles and tendons, slide across bone. Healthy bursae create a smooth, almost frictionless functional gliding surface making normal movement painless...
, ulcers
Peptic ulcer
A peptic ulcer, also known as PUD or peptic ulcer disease, is the most common ulcer of an area of the gastrointestinal tract that is usually acidic and thus extremely painful. It is defined as mucosal erosions equal to or greater than 0.5 cm...
, and a renewed dependence on alcohol and drugs (primarily cocaine), and his performances were routinely panned by critics throughout late 1974 and early 1975. By the time the group reached Japan in February 1975, Davis was nearing a physical breakdown and required copious amounts of alcohol and narcotics to make it through his engagements. Nonetheless, as noted by Richard Cook and Brian Morton, during these concerts his trumpet playing "is of the highest and most adventurous order."
After a Newport Jazz Festival
Newport Jazz Festival
The Newport Jazz Festival is a music festival held every summer in Newport, Rhode Island, USA. It was established in 1954 by socialite Elaine Lorillard, who, together with husband Louis Lorillard, financed the festival for many years. The couple hired jazz impresario George Wein to organize the...
performance at Avery Fisher Hall
Avery Fisher Hall
Avery Fisher Hall is a concert hall, in New York City and is part of the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts complex. It is the home of the New York Philharmonic, with a capacity of 2,738 seats.-History:...
in New York on July 1, 1975, Davis withdrew almost completely from the public eye for six years. As Gil Evans said, "His organism is tired. And after all the music he's contributed for 35 years, he needs a rest." In his memoirs, Davis is characteristically candid about his wayward mental state during this period, describing himself as a hermit, his house as a wreck, and detailing his drug and sex addictions. In 1976, Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...
reported rumors of his imminent demise. Although he stopped practicing trumpet on a regular basis, Davis continued to compose intermittently and made three attempts at recording during his exile from performing; these sessions (one with the assistance of Paul Buckmaster and Gil Evans, who left after not receiving promised compensation) bore little fruit and remain unreleased. In 1979, he placed in the yearly top-ten trumpeter poll of Down Beat
Down Beat
Down Beat is an American magazine devoted to "jazz, blues and beyond" to indicate its expansion beyond the jazz realm which it covered exclusively in previous years. The publication was established in 1934 in Chicago, Illinois...
. Columbia continued to issue compilation album
Compilation album
A compilation album is an album featuring tracks from one or more performers, often culled from a variety of sources The tracks are usually collected according to a common characteristic, such as popularity, genre, source or subject matter...
s and records of unreleased vault material to fulfill contractual obligations. During his period of inactivity, Davis saw the fusion music that he had spearheaded over the past decade enter into the mainstream. When he emerged from retirement, Davis' musical descendants would be in the realm of New Wave
New Wave music
New Wave is a subgenre of :rock music that emerged in the mid to late 1970s alongside punk rock. The term at first generally was synonymous with punk rock before being considered a genre in its own right that incorporated aspects of electronic and experimental music, mod subculture, disco and 1960s...
rock, and in particular the styling of Prince
Prince (musician)
Prince Rogers Nelson , often known simply as Prince, is an American singer, songwriter, musician, and actor. Prince has produced ten platinum albums and thirty Top 40 singles during his career. Prince founded his own recording studio and label; writing, self-producing and playing most, or all, of...
.
Last decade (1981–91)
Cicely Tyson
Cicely Tyson is an American actress. A successful stage actress, Tyson is also known for her Oscar-nominated role in the film Sounder and the television movies The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman and Roots....
. With Tyson, Davis would overcome his cocaine addiction and regain his enthusiasm for music. As he had not played trumpet for the better part of three years, regaining his famed embouchure
Embouchure
The embouchure is the use of facial muscles and the shaping of the lips to the mouthpiece of woodwind instruments or the mouthpiece of the brass instruments.The word is of French origin and is related to the root bouche , 'mouth'....
proved to be particularly arduous. While recording The Man with the Horn
The Man with the Horn
The Man with the Horn is an album released by Miles Davis in 1981, featuring drummer Al Foster, saxophonist Bill Evans, guitarists Mike Stern and Barry Finnerty, and others. It was Davis's first new release since 1975, following a six-year reclusive retirement.Rock-oriented in nature, the music...
(sessions were spread sporadically over 1979–1981), Davis played mostly wahwah with a younger, larger band.
The initial large band was eventually abandoned in favor of a smaller combo featuring saxophonist Bill Evans
Bill Evans (saxophonist)
Bill Evans is an American jazz saxophonist. His father was a classical piano prodigy and until junior high school Evans studied classical clarinet. Early in his studies he was able to hear such artists as Sonny Stitt and Stan Getz live at the Jazz Showcase in Chicago...
and bass player Marcus Miller
Marcus Miller
Marcus Miller is an American jazz composer, producer, and multi-instrumentalist. Miller is best known as a bassist, working with trumpeter Miles Davis, singer Luther Vandross, and saxophonist David Sanborn, as well as maintaining a prolific solo career...
, both of whom would be among Davis' most regular collaborators throughout the decade. He married Tyson in 1981; they would divorce in 1988. The Man with the Horn was finally released in 1981 and received a poor critical reception despite selling fairly well. In May, the new band played two dates as part of the Newport Jazz Festival
Newport Jazz Festival
The Newport Jazz Festival is a music festival held every summer in Newport, Rhode Island, USA. It was established in 1954 by socialite Elaine Lorillard, who, together with husband Louis Lorillard, financed the festival for many years. The couple hired jazz impresario George Wein to organize the...
. The concerts, as well as the live recording We Want Miles
We Want Miles
We Want Miles is double album recorded by jazz trumpeter Miles Davis in 1981, produced by Teo Macero and released by Columbia Records in 1982. The album features one of the first live appearances by Davis in more than five years, at the Boston Club “KIX”, on June 27, 1981. Other tracks are recorded...
from the ensuing tour, received positive reviews.
Mino Cinelu
Mino Cinelu is a French musician. He plays multiple instruments. He is a composer, programmer and producer; and is most often associated primarily for his work as a jazz percussionist.-Biography:Cinelu was born in Saint-Cloud, Hauts-de-Seine...
and guitarist John Scofield
John Scofield
John Scofield , often referred to as "Sco," is an American jazz guitarist and composer, who has played and collaborated with Miles Davis, Dave Liebman, Joe Henderson, Charles Mingus, Joey Defrancesco, Herbie Hancock, Pat Metheny, Bill Frisell, Pat Martino, Mavis Staples, Phil Lesh, Billy Cobham,...
, with whom he worked closely on the album Star People
Star People
Star People is a 1983 album recorded by Miles Davis and issued by Columbia Records. To date, Columbia has not issued Star People on CD in North America, although it is available there as part of the box set Miles Davis: The Complete Columbia Album Collection; CBS/Sony have issued the album on CD in...
. In mid-1983, while working on the tracks for Decoy
Decoy (album)
Decoy is a 1984 album by jazz musician Miles Davis, recorded in 1983.It features keyboardist Robert Irving III and guitarist John Scofield contributing most of the compositions and the other solos...
, an album mixing soul music
Soul music
Soul music is a music genre originating in the United States combining elements of gospel music and rhythm and blues. According to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, soul is "music that arose out of the black experience in America through the transmutation of gospel and rhythm & blues into a form of...
and electronica
Electronica
Electronica includes a wide range of contemporary electronic music designed for a wide range of uses, including foreground listening, some forms of dancing, and background music for other activities; however, unlike electronic dance music, it is not specifically made for dancing...
that was released in 1984, Davis brought in producer, composer and keyboardist Robert Irving III
Robert Irving III
Robert Irving III is an American pianist, composer, arranger and music educator.A native of Chicago, Irving was one of a group of young Chicago musicians that in the late '70s and early '80s formed the nucleus of Miles Davis' recording and touring bands...
, who had earlier collaborated with him on The Man with the Horn. With a seven-piece band, including Scofield, Evans, keyboardist and music director Irving, drummer Al Foster
Al Foster
Al Foster is an American jazz drummer. Foster played with Miles Davis's large funk fusion group in the 70s, was one of the few people to have contact with Miles during his retirement, and was also part of his comeback album The Man With the Horn of 1981...
and bassist Darryl Jones
Darryl Jones
Darryl Jones , also known as "The Munch", is an American bass guitarist. Jones began his notable career as a session musician, where he gained the experience and confidence to play with some of the most highly regarded recording artists, in jazz, blues, and rock music...
(later of The Rolling Stones
The Rolling Stones
The Rolling Stones are an English rock band, formed in London in April 1962 by Brian Jones , Ian Stewart , Mick Jagger , and Keith Richards . Bassist Bill Wyman and drummer Charlie Watts completed the early line-up...
), Davis played a series of European gigs to positive receptions. While in Europe, he took part in the recording of Aura
Aura (Miles Davis album)
Aura is a concept album by Miles Davis, produced by Palle Mikkelborg, released in 1989. All compositions and arrangements are by Danish composer/trumpeter Palle Mikkelborg, who created the suite in tribute to Miles Davis when Davis received the Léonie Sonning Music Prize in December 1984, the year...
, an orchestral tribute to Davis composed by Danish trumpeter Palle Mikkelborg
Palle Mikkelborg
Palle Mikkelborg , is a Danish jazz trumpeter, composer, arranger and record producer. He started playing professionally in 1960, and has since been a dominant figure on the Danish and international progressive jazz scene...
.
You're Under Arrest, Davis' next album, was released in 1985 and included another brief stylistic detour. Included on the album were his interpretations of Cyndi Lauper
Cyndi Lauper
Cynthia Ann Stephanie "Cyndi" Lauper is an American singer, songwriter, actress and LGBT rights activist. She achieved success in the mid-1980s with the release of the album She's So Unusual and became the first female singer to have four top-five singles released from one album...
's ballad "Time After Time
Time after Time (Cyndi Lauper song)
"Time After Time" is a song by American singer Cyndi Lauper, released as the second single from her album She's So Unusual. It reached number one on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 chart on June 9, 1984, and remained there for two weeks...
", and "Human Nature
Human Nature (Michael Jackson song)
"Human Nature" is a song by American recording artist Michael Jackson. It was written and composed by Steve Porcaro and John Bettis, and produced by Quincy Jones. It is the fifth single from the singer's sixth solo album, Thriller . Initially, Porcaro had recorded a rough demo of the song on a...
" from Michael Jackson
Michael Jackson
Michael Joseph Jackson was an American recording artist, entertainer, and businessman. Referred to as the King of Pop, or by his initials MJ, Jackson is recognized as the most successful entertainer of all time by Guinness World Records...
. Davis considered releasing an entire album of pop songs and recorded dozens of them, but the idea was scrapped. Davis noted that many of today's accepted jazz standards were in fact pop songs from Broadway theater, and that he was simply updating the "standards" repertoire with new material. 1985 also saw Davis guest-star on the TV show Miami Vice
Miami Vice
Miami Vice is an American television series produced by Michael Mann for NBC. The series starred Don Johnson and Philip Michael Thomas as two Metro-Dade Police Department detectives working undercover in Miami. It ran for five seasons on NBC from 1984–1989...
as pimp
Pimp
A pimp is an agent for prostitutes who collects part of their earnings. The pimp may receive this money in return for advertising services, physical protection, or for providing a location where she may engage clients...
and minor criminal Ivory Jones in the episode titled "Junk Love" (first aired November 8, 1985).
You're Under Arrest also proved to be Davis' final album for Columbia. Trumpeter Wynton Marsalis
Wynton Marsalis
Wynton Learson Marsalis is a trumpeter, composer, bandleader, music educator, and Artistic Director of Jazz at Lincoln Center. Marsalis has promoted the appreciation of classical and jazz music often to young audiences...
publicly dismissed Davis' more recent fusion recordings as not being "'true' jazz", comments Davis initially shrugged off, calling Marsalis "a nice young man, only confused". This changed after Marsalis appeared, unannounced, onstage in the midst of Davis' performance at the inaugural Vancouver International Jazz Festival
Vancouver International Jazz Festival
The Vancouver International Jazz Festival is an annual summer event in Vancouver, Canada.The festival grew out of a local jazz scene that centred around Vancouver Co-op Radio , a community radio station, in the early 1980s...
in 1986. Marsalis whispered into Davis' ear that "someone" had told him to do so; Davis responded by ordering him off the stage.
Davis grew irritated at Columbia's delay releasing Aura. The breaking point in the label-artist relationship appears to have come when a Columbia jazz producer requested Davis place a goodwill birthday call to Marsalis. Davis signed with Warner Brothers
Warner Bros. Records
Warner Bros. Records Inc. is an American record label. It was the foundation label of the present-day Warner Music Group, and now operates as a wholly owned subsidiary of that corporation. It maintains a close relationship with its former parent, Warner Bros. Pictures, although the two companies...
shortly thereafter.
Davis collaborated with a number of figures from the British new wave
New Wave music
New Wave is a subgenre of :rock music that emerged in the mid to late 1970s alongside punk rock. The term at first generally was synonymous with punk rock before being considered a genre in its own right that incorporated aspects of electronic and experimental music, mod subculture, disco and 1960s...
movement during this period, including Scritti Politti
Scritti Politti
Scritti Politti are a British band, originally formed in 1977 in Leeds, Yorkshire, England. Although there have been various changes to the line-up, Cardiff-born singer-songwriter Green Gartside was the founding member of the band and the only member to have remained throughout the group's...
. At the invitation of producer Bill Laswell
Bill Laswell
Bill Laswell is an American bassist, producer and record label owner....
, Davis recorded some trumpet parts during sessions for Public Image Ltd.
Public Image Ltd.
Public Image Ltd are an English post-punk band formed by vocalist John Lydon , guitarist Keith Levene and bassist Jah Wobble, with frequent subsequent personnel changes. Lydon is the sole constant member of the band....
's Album, according to Public Image's John Lydon
John Lydon
John Joseph Lydon , also known by the former stage name Johnny Rotten, is a singer-songwriter and television presenter, best known as the lead singer of punk rock band the Sex Pistols from 1975 until 1978, and again for various revivals during the 1990s and 2000s...
in the liner notes of their Plastic Box box set. In Lydon's words, however, "strangely enough, we didn't use (his contributions)." (Also according to Lydon in the Plastic Box notes, Davis favorably compared Lydon's singing voice to his trumpet sound.)
Having first taken part in the Artists United Against Apartheid
Artists United Against Apartheid
Artists United Against Apartheid was a 1985 protest group founded by activist and performer Steven Van Zandt and record producer Arthur Baker to protest apartheid in South Africa...
recording, Davis signed with Warner Brothers records and reunited with Marcus Miller
Marcus Miller
Marcus Miller is an American jazz composer, producer, and multi-instrumentalist. Miller is best known as a bassist, working with trumpeter Miles Davis, singer Luther Vandross, and saxophonist David Sanborn, as well as maintaining a prolific solo career...
. The resulting record, Tutu
Tutu (album)
Tutu is an album released in 1986 by trumpeter Miles Davis on Warner Bros. Records.Originally planned as a collaboration with pop singer/songwriter Prince, Davis ultimately worked with bassist/multi-instrumentalist Marcus Miller...
(1986), would be his first to use modern studio tools—programmed synthesizers, samples
Sampling (music)
In music, sampling is the act of taking a portion, or sample, of one sound recording and reusing it as an instrument or a different sound recording of a song or piece. Sampling was originally developed by experimental musicians working with musique concrète and electroacoustic music, who physically...
and drum loops—to create an entirely new setting for his playing. Ecstatically reviewed on its release, the album would frequently be described as the modern counterpart of Sketches of Spain and won a Grammy in 1987.
He followed Tutu with Amandla
Amandla (album)
Amandla is an album by jazz musician Miles Davis, released in 1989. It is the third collaboration between Miles Davis and producer/bassist Marcus Miller, after Tutu and Music From Siesta , and their final album together. The album mixes elements of the genres go-go, zouk, funk and swing jazz,...
, another collaboration with Miller and George Duke
George Duke
George Duke is a multi-faceted American musician, known as a keyboard pioneer, composer, singer and producer in both jazz and popular mainstream musical genres. He has worked with numerous acclaimed artists as arranger, music director, writer and co-writer, record producer and professor of music...
, plus the soundtracks to four movies: Street Smart
Street Smart (1987 film)
Street Smart is a film directed by Jerry Schatzberg and starring Christopher Reeve, Morgan Freeman and Kathy Baker.-Plot:Magazine reporter Jonathan Fisher , in danger of losing his job, promises to write a hard-hitting story on prostitution...
, Siesta
Siesta (film)
Siesta is a 1987 film directed by Mary Lambert, and starring Ellen Barkin, Gabriel Byrne and Jodie Foster. It also stars Martin Sheen, Isabella Rossellini, Grace Jones, Julian Sands and Alexei Sayle....
, The Hot Spot
The Hot Spot
The Hot Spot is a 1990 American drama film directed by Dennis Hopper and based on the 1952 book Hell Hath No Fury by Charles Williams. It stars Don Johnson, Virginia Madsen, and Jennifer Connelly, and features a score by Jack Nitzsche played by John Lee Hooker, Miles Davis, Taj Mahal and Roy...
(with bluesman John Lee Hooker
John Lee Hooker
John Lee Hooker was an American blues singer-songwriter and guitarist.Hooker began his life as the son of a sharecropper, William Hooker, and rose to prominence performing his own unique style of what was originally closest to Delta blues. He developed a 'talking blues' style that was his trademark...
), and Dingo. He continued to tour with a band of constantly rotating personnel and a critical stock at a level higher than it had been for 15 years. His last recordings, both released posthumously, were the hip hop
Hip hop music
Hip hop music, also called hip-hop, rap music or hip-hop music, is a musical genre consisting of a stylized rhythmic music that commonly accompanies rapping, a rhythmic and rhyming speech that is chanted...
-influenced studio album Doo-Bop
Doo-Bop
Doo-Bop was jazz innovator Miles Davis' final studio album, which would have marked the beginning of the artist's turn to hip-hop-oriented tracks. However, Davis died on September 28, 1991, at which time only six tunes for the album had been completed...
and Miles & Quincy Live at Montreux
Miles & Quincy Live at Montreux
Miles & Quincy Live at Montreux is a Miles Davis collaboration with Quincy Jones for the 1991 Montreux Jazz Festival. For the first time in three decades, Davis returned to the songs arranged by Gil Evans on such classic 1950s albums as Miles Ahead, Porgy and Bess and Sketches of Spain...
, a collaboration with Quincy Jones
Quincy Jones
Quincy Delightt Jones, Jr. is an American record producer and musician. A conductor, musical arranger, film composer, television producer, and trumpeter. His career spans five decades in the entertainment industry and a record 79 Grammy Award nominations, 27 Grammys, including a Grammy Legend...
for the 1991 Montreux Jazz Festival
Montreux Jazz Festival
The Montreux Jazz Festival is the best-known music festival in Switzerland and one of the most prestigious in Europe; it is held annually in early July in Montreux on the shores of Lake Geneva...
in which Davis performed the repertoire from his 1940s and 1950s recordings for the first time in decades.
In 1988 he had a small part as a street musician in the film Scrooged
Scrooged
Scrooged is a 1988 American comedy film, a modernization of Charles Dickens' novella, A Christmas Carol. The film was produced and directed by Richard Donner, and the cinematography was by Michael Chapman. The screenplay was written by Mitch Glazer and Michael O'Donoghue...
, starring Bill Murray
Bill Murray
William James "Bill" Murray is an American actor and comedian. He first gained national exposure on Saturday Night Live in which he earned an Emmy Award and later went on to star in a number of critically and commercially successful comedic films, including Caddyshack , Ghostbusters , and...
. In 1989, Davis was interviewed on 60 Minutes
60 Minutes
60 Minutes is an American television news magazine, which has run on CBS since 1968. The program was created by producer Don Hewitt who set it apart by using a unique style of reporter-centered investigation....
by Harry Reasoner. He received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award
Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award
The Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award is awarded by the Recording Academy to "performers who, during their lifetimes, have made creative contributions of outstanding artistic significance to the field of recording."...
in 1990.
In early 1991, he appeared in the Rolf de Heer
Rolf de Heer
Rolf de Heer is a Dutch film director, writer and producer living in Australia. De Heer was born in Heemskerk in The Netherlands but migrated to Sydney when he was eight years old. He attended the Australian Film Television and Radio School in Sydney. His company is called Vertigo Productions and...
film Dingo
Dingo (film)
Dingo is a 1991 Australian film directed by Rolf de Heer and written by Marc Rosenberg. It traces the pilgrimage of John Anderson , an average guy with a passion for jazz, from his home in outback Western Australia to the jazz clubs of Paris, to meet his idol, jazz trumpeter Billy Cross...
as a jazz musician. In the film's opening sequence, Davis and his band unexpectedly land on a remote airstrip in the Australian outback and proceed to perform for the stunned locals. The performance was one of Davis' last on film.
Miles Davis died on September 28, 1991 from the combined effects of a stroke, pneumonia
Pneumonia
Pneumonia is an inflammatory condition of the lung—especially affecting the microscopic air sacs —associated with fever, chest symptoms, and a lack of air space on a chest X-ray. Pneumonia is typically caused by an infection but there are a number of other causes...
and respiratory failure
Respiratory failure
The term respiratory failure, in medicine, is used to describe inadequate gas exchange by the respiratory system, with the result that arterial oxygen and/or carbon dioxide levels cannot be maintained within their normal ranges. A drop in blood oxygenation is known as hypoxemia; a rise in arterial...
in Santa Monica, California
Santa Monica, California
Santa Monica is a beachfront city in western Los Angeles County, California, US. Situated on Santa Monica Bay, it is surrounded on three sides by the city of Los Angeles — Pacific Palisades on the northwest, Brentwood on the north, West Los Angeles on the northeast, Mar Vista on the east, and...
at the age of 65. He is buried in Woodlawn Cemetery in The Bronx.
Legacy and influence
Miles Davis is regarded as one of the most innovative, influential and respected figures in the history of music. He has been described as “one of the great innovators in jazz”. The Rolling Stone Encyclopedia of Rock & Roll noted "Miles Davis played a crucial and inevitably controversial role in every major development in jazz since the mid-'40s, and no other jazz musician has had so profound an effect on rock. Miles Davis was the most widely recognized jazz musician of his era, an outspoken social critic and an arbiter of style—in attitude and fashion—as well as music". His album Kind of BlueKind of Blue
Kind of Blue is a studio album by American jazz musician Miles Davis, released August 17, 1959, on Columbia Records in the United States. Recording sessions for the album took place at Columbia's 30th Street Studio in New York City on March 2 and April 22, 1959...
is the best-selling album in the history of jazz music and was praised by the United States House of Representatives
United States House of Representatives
The United States House of Representatives is one of the two Houses of the United States Congress, the bicameral legislature which also includes the Senate.The composition and powers of the House are established in Article One of the Constitution...
to "pass a symbolic resolution honoring the masterpiece and reaffirming jazz as a national treasure."
Many well-known musicians rose to prominence as members of Davis' ensembles, including saxophonists Gerry Mulligan
Gerry Mulligan
Gerald Joseph "Gerry" Mulligan was an American jazz saxophonist, clarinetist, composer and arranger. Though Mulligan is primarily known as one of the leading baritone saxophonists in jazz history – playing the instrument with a light and airy tone in the era of cool jazz – he was also...
, John Coltrane
John Coltrane
John William Coltrane was an American jazz saxophonist and composer. Working in the bebop and hard bop idioms early in his career, Coltrane helped pioneer the use of modes in jazz and later was at the forefront of free jazz...
, Cannonball Adderley, George Coleman
George Coleman
George Edward Coleman is an American hard bop saxophonist, bandleader, and composer, known chiefly for his work with Miles Davis and Herbie Hancock in the 1960s.-Biography:...
, Wayne Shorter
Wayne Shorter
Wayne Shorter is an American jazz saxophonist and composer.He is generally acknowledged to be jazz's greatest living composer, and many of his compositions have become standards...
, Dave Liebman
Dave Liebman
Dave Liebman is an American saxophonist and flautist. In June 2010, he received a NEA Jazz Masters lifetime achievement award from the National Endowment for the Arts.-Biography:...
, Branford Marsalis
Branford Marsalis
Branford Marsalis is an American saxophonist, composer and bandleader. While primarily known for his work in jazz as the leader of the Branford Marsalis Quartet, he also performs frequently as a soloist with classical ensembles and has led the group Buckshot LeFonque.-Biography:Marsalis was born...
and Kenny Garrett
Kenny Garrett
Kenny Garrett is a Grammy Award-winning American post bop jazz saxophonist and flautist who gained fame in his youth as a member of the Duke Ellington Orchestra and of Miles Davis's band. He has since pursued a critically acclaimed solo career...
; trombonist J. J. Johnson; pianists Horace Silver
Horace Silver
Horace Silver , born Horace Ward Martin Tavares Silva in Norwalk, Connecticut, is an American jazz pianist and composer....
, Red Garland
Red Garland
William "Red" Garland was an American hard bop jazz pianist whose block chord style, in part originated by Milt Buckner, influenced many forthcoming pianists in the jazz idiom.-Beginnings:...
, Wynton Kelly
Wynton Kelly
Wynton Kelly was a Jamaican-born jazz pianist, who spent his career in the United States. He is perhaps best known for working with trumpeter Miles Davis from 1959-1962.-Biography:...
, Bill Evans
Bill Evans
William John Evans, known as Bill Evans was an American jazz pianist. His use of impressionist harmony, inventive interpretation of traditional jazz repertoire, and trademark rhythmically independent, "singing" melodic lines influenced a generation of pianists including: Chick Corea, Herbie...
, Herbie Hancock
Herbie Hancock
Herbert Jeffrey "Herbie" Hancock is an American pianist, bandleader and composer. As part of Miles Davis's "second great quintet," Hancock helped to redefine the role of a jazz rhythm section and was one of the primary architects of the "post-bop" sound...
, Joe Zawinul
Joe Zawinul
Josef Erich Zawinul was an Austrian-American jazz keyboardist and composer.First coming to prominence with saxophonist Cannonball Adderley, Zawinul went on to play with trumpeter Miles Davis, and to become one of the creators of jazz fusion, an innovative musical genre that combined jazz with...
, Chick Corea
Chick Corea
Armando Anthony "Chick" Corea is an American jazz pianist, keyboardist, and composer.Many of his compositions are considered jazz standards. As a member of Miles Davis' band in the 1960s, he participated in the birth of the electric jazz fusion movement. In the 1970s he formed Return to Forever...
, Keith Jarrett
Keith Jarrett
Keith Jarrett is an American pianist and composer who performs both jazz and classical music.Jarrett started his career with Art Blakey, moving on to play with Charles Lloyd and Miles Davis. Since the early 1970s he has enjoyed a great deal of success in jazz, jazz fusion, and classical music; as...
and Kei Akagi
Kei Akagi
is a Japanese American jazz pianist most known as a sideman. In particular he is known for his work with the Airto Moreira/Flora Purim group and in Miles Davis's band in the late 1980s and early 1990s....
; guitarists John McLaughlin
John McLaughlin (musician)
John McLaughlin , also known as Mahavishnu John McLaughlin, is an English guitarist, bandleader and composer...
, Pete Cosey
Pete Cosey
Pete Cosey is an African-American guitarist most famous for playing with Miles Davis' band between 1973 and 1975. His fiercely flanged and distorted guitar bore comparisons to Jimi Hendrix...
, John Scofield
John Scofield
John Scofield , often referred to as "Sco," is an American jazz guitarist and composer, who has played and collaborated with Miles Davis, Dave Liebman, Joe Henderson, Charles Mingus, Joey Defrancesco, Herbie Hancock, Pat Metheny, Bill Frisell, Pat Martino, Mavis Staples, Phil Lesh, Billy Cobham,...
and Mike Stern
Mike Stern
Mike Stern is an American jazz guitarist. After playing for a few years with Blood, Sweat & Tears, he landed a gig with Billy Cobham and then broke through with Miles Davis' comeback band from 1981 to 1983, and again in 1985. Since then, he launched a solo career, releasing more than a dozen albums...
; bassists Paul Chambers
Paul Chambers
Paul Laurence Dunbar Chambers, Jr. was a jazz bassist. A fixture of rhythm sections during the 1950s and 1960s, his importance in the development of jazz bass can be measured not only by the length and breadth of his work in this short period but also his impeccable time, intonation, and virtuosic...
, Ron Carter
Ron Carter
Ron Carter is an American jazz double-bassist. His appearances on over 2,500 albums make him one of the most-recorded bassists in jazz history, along with Milt Hinton, Ray Brown and Leroy Vinnegar. Carter is also an acclaimed cellist who has recorded numerous times on that...
, Dave Holland
Dave Holland
Dave Holland is an English jazz double bassist, composer and bandleader who has been performing and recording for five decades. He has lived in the United States for 40 years....
, Marcus Miller
Marcus Miller
Marcus Miller is an American jazz composer, producer, and multi-instrumentalist. Miller is best known as a bassist, working with trumpeter Miles Davis, singer Luther Vandross, and saxophonist David Sanborn, as well as maintaining a prolific solo career...
and Darryl Jones
Darryl Jones
Darryl Jones , also known as "The Munch", is an American bass guitarist. Jones began his notable career as a session musician, where he gained the experience and confidence to play with some of the most highly regarded recording artists, in jazz, blues, and rock music...
; and drummers Elvin Jones
Elvin Jones
Elvin Ray Jones was a jazz drummer of the post-bop era. He showed interest in drums at a young age, watching the circus bands march by his family's home in Pontiac, Michigan....
, Philly Joe Jones
Philly Joe Jones
Joseph Rudolph Jones was a Philadelphia-born United States jazz drummer, known as the drummer for the Miles Davis Quintet.Philly Joe Jones was often confused with another influential jazz drummer, Jo Jones...
, Jimmy Cobb
Jimmy Cobb
-External links:* - includes full discography* * * * * * *...
, Tony Williams, Billy Cobham
Billy Cobham
William C. Cobham is a Panamanian American jazz drummer, composer and bandleader, who has called Switzerland home since the late 1970s....
, Jack DeJohnette
Jack DeJohnette
Jack DeJohnette is an American jazz drummer, pianist, and composer. He is one of the most influential jazz drummers of the 20th century, due to extensive work as leader and sideman for musicians like Miles Davis, Joe Henderson, Freddie Hubbard, Keith Jarrett and Sonny...
, and Al Foster
Al Foster
Al Foster is an American jazz drummer. Foster played with Miles Davis's large funk fusion group in the 70s, was one of the few people to have contact with Miles during his retirement, and was also part of his comeback album The Man With the Horn of 1981...
.
As an innovative bandleader and composer, Miles Davis has influenced many notable musicians and bands from diverse genres. These include Wayne Shorter
Wayne Shorter
Wayne Shorter is an American jazz saxophonist and composer.He is generally acknowledged to be jazz's greatest living composer, and many of his compositions have become standards...
, Cannonball Adderley, Herbie Hancock
Herbie Hancock
Herbert Jeffrey "Herbie" Hancock is an American pianist, bandleader and composer. As part of Miles Davis's "second great quintet," Hancock helped to redefine the role of a jazz rhythm section and was one of the primary architects of the "post-bop" sound...
, Cassandra Wilson
Cassandra Wilson
Cassandra Wilson is an American jazz musician, vocalist, songwriter, and producer from Jackson, Mississippi. Described by critic Gary Giddins as "a singer blessed with an unmistakable timbre and attack [who has] expanded the playing field" by incorporating country, blues and folk music into her...
, Lalo Schifrin
Lalo Schifrin
Lalo Schifrin is an Argentine composer, pianist and conductor. He is best known for his film and TV scores, such as the "Theme from Mission: Impossible". He has received four Grammy Awards and six Oscar nominations...
, Tangerine Dream
Tangerine Dream
Tangerine Dream is a German electronic music group founded in 1967 by Edgar Froese. The band has undergone many personnel changes over the years, with Froese being the only continuous member...
, Brand X
Brand X
Brand X was a jazz fusion band active between 1975–1980 and 1992-1999. Noted members included Phil Collins , Percy Jones , John Goodsall and Robin Lumley ....
, Mtume
Mtume
Mtume was a funk and soul group that had several R&B hits in the 1980s. Its founder, percussionist James Mtume, previously played with Miles Davis in the 1970s. Other members of the group included Reggie Lucas and Tawatha Agee.-History:...
, Benny Bailey
Benny Bailey
Benny Bailey, born Ernest Harold Bailey , was an American bebop and hard-bop jazz trumpeter.-Biography:...
, Joe Bonner
Joe Bonner
Joe Bonner is a jazz pianist who is featured in The Bonner Party, a jazz quartet.He was born in Rocky Mount, North Carolina and studied at Virginia State College, but indicates he learned more by musicians he worked with. In the seventies he played with Roy Haynes, Freddie Hubbard, and Billy...
, Don Cherry
Don Cherry (jazz)
Donald Eugene Cherry was an innovative African-American jazz cornetist whose career began with a long association with saxophonist Ornette Coleman. He went on to live in many parts of the world and work with a wide variety of musicians.-Biography:Cherry was born in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, and...
, Urszula Dudziak
Urszula Dudziak
Urszula Bogumiła Dudziak-Urbaniak is a leading Polish jazz vocalist. She has worked with such artists as Krzysztof Komeda, Michał Urbaniak , Gil Evans, Archie Shepp, and Lester Bowie...
, Sugizo
Sugizo
, born , is a Japanese musician, singer-songwriter and record producer. Referred to by his stage name Sugizo, he is best known as lead guitarist of the rock band Luna Sea, who were popular in the 1990s. He started his solo career in 1997 and has since collaborated with many artists...
, Bill Evans
Bill Evans
William John Evans, known as Bill Evans was an American jazz pianist. His use of impressionist harmony, inventive interpretation of traditional jazz repertoire, and trademark rhythmically independent, "singing" melodic lines influenced a generation of pianists including: Chick Corea, Herbie...
, Bill Hardman
Bill Hardman
William Franklin Hardman, Jr. was an American jazz trumpeter and flugelhornist who chiefly played hard bop.-Biography:...
, The Lounge Lizards
The Lounge Lizards
The Lounge Lizards are a jazz group formed in 1978 by saxophone player John Lurie.Initially a tongue in cheek "fake jazz" combo, drawing on punk rock and no wave as much as jazz, The Lounge Lizards have since become respected for their creative and distinctive sound.-History:Lounge Lizards were...
, Hugh Masekela
Hugh Masekela
Hugh Ramopolo Masekela is a South African trumpeter, flugelhornist, cornetist, composer, and singer.-Early life:Masekela was born in Kwa-Guqa Township, Witbank, South Africa. He began singing and playing piano as a child...
, John McLaughlin
John McLaughlin (musician)
John McLaughlin , also known as Mahavishnu John McLaughlin, is an English guitarist, bandleader and composer...
, King Crimson
King Crimson
King Crimson are a rock band founded in London, England in 1969. Often categorised as a foundational progressive rock group, the band have incorporated diverse influences and instrumentation during their history...
, Steely Dan
Steely Dan
Steely Dan is an American rock band; its core members are Donald Fagen and Walter Becker. The band's popularity peaked in the late 1970s, with the release of seven albums blending elements of jazz, rock, funk, R&B, and pop...
, Frank Zappa
Frank Zappa
Frank Vincent Zappa was an American composer, singer-songwriter, electric guitarist, record producer and film director. In a career spanning more than 30 years, Zappa wrote rock, jazz, orchestral and musique concrète works. He also directed feature-length films and music videos, and designed...
, Duane Allman
Duane Allman
Howard Duane Allman was an American guitarist, session musician and the primary co-founder of the southern rock group The Allman Brothers Band...
, Radiohead
Radiohead
Radiohead are an English rock band from Abingdon, Oxfordshire, formed in 1985. The band consists of Thom Yorke , Jonny Greenwood , Ed O'Brien , Colin Greenwood and Phil Selway .Radiohead released their debut single "Creep" in 1992...
, The Flaming Lips
The Flaming Lips
The Flaming Lips are an American alternative rock band, formed in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma in 1983.Melodically, their sound contains lush, multi-layered, psychedelic rock arrangements, but lyrically their compositions show elements of space rock, including unusual song and album titles—such as "What...
, Lydia Lunch
Lydia Lunch
Lydia Lunch is an American singer, poet, writer, and actress whose career was spawned by the New York No Wave scene...
, Talk Talk
Talk Talk
Talk Talk were an English musical group, active from 1981 to 1991. The group had a string of international hit singles including "Today", "Talk Talk", "It's My Life", "Such a Shame", "Dum Dum Girl", "Life's What You Make It" and "Living in Another World"....
, Michael Franks, Sting, Lonnie Liston Smith
Lonnie Liston Smith
Lonnie Liston Smith, Jr. is an American jazz, soul, and funk musician who played with important free jazz artists such as Pharoah Sanders and Miles Davis before forming Lonnie Liston Smith And The Cosmic Echoes, recording a number of albums widely regarded as classics in the fusion / Quiet Storm /...
, Jiří Stivín
Jirí Stivín
Jiří Stivín is a Czech flute player and composer.He graduated from the Film Faculty of the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague . He also studied composition at the Royal Academy of Music as well as at the Prague Academy of Music .Stivín performs music from the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, and...
, Tim Hagans
Tim Hagans
Tim Hagans is a jazz trumpeter and composer.He has been nominated for Grammys for Best Instrumental Composition for "Box of Cannoli" from The Avatar Session ; and Best Contemporary Jazz CD for Animation*Imagination and Re-Animation .He grew up in Dayton, Ohio...
, Julie Christensen
Julie Christensen
Julie Christensen is an American singer, born in Iowa and resident of Ojai, California. She has worked with musicians including Leonard Cohen, Todd Rundgren, Robben Ford, Iggy Pop, Public Image Limited, Van Dyke Parks, John Doe, Exene Cervenka, Steve Wynn and k.d. lang.From 1983 to 1987...
, Jerry Garcia
Jerry Garcia
Jerome John "Jerry" Garcia was an American musician best known for his lead guitar work, singing and songwriting with the band the Grateful Dead...
, David Grisman
David Grisman
David Grisman is an American bluegrass/newgrass mandolinist and composer of acoustic music. In the early 1990s, he started the Acoustic Disc record label in an effort to preserve and spread acoustic or instrumental music.-Biography:Grisman grew up in Hackensack, New Jersey...
, Vassar Clements
Vassar Clements
Vassar Clements was a Grammy Award- winning American jazz, swing, and bluegrass fiddler. Clements has been dubbed the Father of Hillbilly Jazz, an improvisational style that blends and borrows from swing, hot jazz, and bluegrass along with roots also in country and other musical...
, Snooky Young
Snooky Young
Eugene Edward "Snooky" Young was an American jazz trumpeter. He was known for his mastery of the plunger mute, with which he was able to create a wide range of sounds.-Biography:...
, Prince
Prince (musician)
Prince Rogers Nelson , often known simply as Prince, is an American singer, songwriter, musician, and actor. Prince has produced ten platinum albums and thirty Top 40 singles during his career. Prince founded his own recording studio and label; writing, self-producing and playing most, or all, of...
, and Christian Scott
Christian Scott
Christian Scott, born March 31, 1983, in New Orleans, Louisiana, is the 2010 Edison Award winner for Best International Jazz Artist and a Grammy Award-nominated jazz trumpeter, composer and producer. He has been heralded by JazzTimes magazine as "the Architect of a new commercially viable fusion"...
.
Miles' influence on the people who played with him has been described by music writer and author Christopher Smith as follows:
Miles Davis' artistic interest was in the creation and manipulation of ritual space, in which gestures could be endowed with symbolic power sufficient to form a functional communicative, and hence musical, vocabulary. [...] Miles' performance tradition emphasized orality and the transmission of information and artistic insight from individual to individual. His position in that tradition, and his personality, talents, and artistic interests, impelled him to pursue a uniquely individual solution to the problems and the experiential possibilities of improvised performance.
His approach, owing largely to the African American performance tradition that focused on individual expression, emphatic interaction, and creative response to shifting contents, had a profound impact on generations of jazz musicians.
In 1986, the New England Conservatory awarded Miles Davis an Honorary Doctorate
Honorary degree
An honorary degree or a degree honoris causa is an academic degree for which a university has waived the usual requirements, such as matriculation, residence, study, and the passing of examinations...
for his extraordinary contributions to music. Since 1960 the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences
National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences
The National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences, Inc., known variously as The Recording Academy or NARAS, is a U.S. organization of musicians, producers, recording engineers and other recording professionals dedicated to improving the quality of life and cultural condition for music and its...
(NARAS) has honored him with eight Grammy Awards, a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, and three Grammy Hall of Fame Awards.
In 2010, Moldejazz
Moldejazz
Molde International Jazz Festival takes place annually in July, and is known as one of the oldest jazz festivals in Europe. It was initiated by the local Storyville Jazz Club...
premiered a play called Driving Miles which focused on a landmark concert Davis performed in Molde
Molde
is a city and municipality in Møre og Romsdal county, Norway. It is part of the Romsdal region. The municipality is located on the Romsdal Peninsula, surrounding the Fannefjord and Moldefjord...
, Norway, in 1984.
Awards
- Winner; Down BeatDown BeatDown Beat is an American magazine devoted to "jazz, blues and beyond" to indicate its expansion beyond the jazz realm which it covered exclusively in previous years. The publication was established in 1934 in Chicago, Illinois...
Reader's Poll Best Trumpet Player 1955 - Winner; Down BeatDown BeatDown Beat is an American magazine devoted to "jazz, blues and beyond" to indicate its expansion beyond the jazz realm which it covered exclusively in previous years. The publication was established in 1934 in Chicago, Illinois...
Reader's Poll Best Trumpet Player 1957 - Winner; Down BeatDown BeatDown Beat is an American magazine devoted to "jazz, blues and beyond" to indicate its expansion beyond the jazz realm which it covered exclusively in previous years. The publication was established in 1934 in Chicago, Illinois...
Reader's Poll Best Trumpet Player 1961 - Grammy AwardGrammy AwardA Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...
for Best Jazz Composition Of More Than Five Minutes DurationGrammy Award for Best Original Jazz CompositionThe Grammy Award for Best Original Jazz Composition was awarded from 1961 to 1967. In 1961 the award was called the Grammy Award for Best Jazz Composition of More Than Five Minutes Duration...
for Sketches of SpainSketches of SpainSketches of Spain is an album by Miles Davis, recorded between November 1959 and March 1960 at the Columbia 30th Street Studio in New York City....
(1960) - Grammy AwardGrammy AwardA Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...
for Best Jazz Performance, Large Group Or Soloist With Large GroupGrammy Award for Best Large Jazz Ensemble AlbumThe Grammy Award for Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album has been presented since 1961. From 1962 to 1971 and 1979 to 1991 the award title specified instrumental performances...
for Bitches BrewBitches BrewBitches Brew is a studio double album by jazz musician Miles Davis, released in April 1970 on Columbia Records. The album continued his experimentation with electric instruments previously featured on his critically acclaimed In a Silent Way album...
(1970) - Grammy AwardGrammy AwardA Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...
for Best Jazz Instrumental Performance, Soloist for We Want MilesWe Want MilesWe Want Miles is double album recorded by jazz trumpeter Miles Davis in 1981, produced by Teo Macero and released by Columbia Records in 1982. The album features one of the first live appearances by Davis in more than five years, at the Boston Club “KIX”, on June 27, 1981. Other tracks are recorded...
(1982) - Sonning Award for Lifetime Achievement In Music (1984; Copenhagen, Denmark)
- Doctor of Music, honoris causa (1986; New England Conservatory)
- Grammy AwardGrammy AwardA Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...
for Best Jazz Instrumental Performance, Soloist for TutuTutu (album)Tutu is an album released in 1986 by trumpeter Miles Davis on Warner Bros. Records.Originally planned as a collaboration with pop singer/songwriter Prince, Davis ultimately worked with bassist/multi-instrumentalist Marcus Miller...
(1986) - Grammy AwardGrammy AwardA Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...
for Best Jazz Instrumental Performance, Soloist for AuraAura (Miles Davis album)Aura is a concept album by Miles Davis, produced by Palle Mikkelborg, released in 1989. All compositions and arrangements are by Danish composer/trumpeter Palle Mikkelborg, who created the suite in tribute to Miles Davis when Davis received the Léonie Sonning Music Prize in December 1984, the year...
(1989) - Grammy AwardGrammy AwardA Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...
for Best Jazz Instrumental Performance, Big Band for AuraAura (Miles Davis album)Aura is a concept album by Miles Davis, produced by Palle Mikkelborg, released in 1989. All compositions and arrangements are by Danish composer/trumpeter Palle Mikkelborg, who created the suite in tribute to Miles Davis when Davis received the Léonie Sonning Music Prize in December 1984, the year...
(1989) - Grammy Lifetime Achievement AwardGrammy Lifetime Achievement AwardThe Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award is awarded by the Recording Academy to "performers who, during their lifetimes, have made creative contributions of outstanding artistic significance to the field of recording."...
(1990) - Australian Film Institute AwardAustralian Film Institute AwardsThe Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts Award, known as the AACTA Award , is an accolade presented annually by the Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts . The awards recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry and television industry, including directors,...
for Best Original Music ScoreAustralian Film Institute Award for Best Original Music ScoreThe Australian Film Institute Award for Best Original Music Score is an award in the annual Australian Film Institute Awards.-Previous winners:*1974/5 – Bruce Smeaton *1976 – Not awarded....
for DingoDingo (film)Dingo is a 1991 Australian film directed by Rolf de Heer and written by Marc Rosenberg. It traces the pilgrimage of John Anderson , an average guy with a passion for jazz, from his home in outback Western Australia to the jazz clubs of Paris, to meet his idol, jazz trumpeter Billy Cross...
, shared with Michel LegrandMichel LegrandMichel Jean Legrand is a French musical composer, arranger, conductor, and pianist...
(1991) - KnightKnightA knight was a member of a class of lower nobility in the High Middle Ages.By the Late Middle Ages, the rank had become associated with the ideals of chivalry, a code of conduct for the perfect courtly Christian warrior....
ed into the Legion of Honor (July 16, 1991; Paris) - Grammy AwardGrammy AwardA Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...
for Best R&B Instrumental Performance for Doo-BopDoo-BopDoo-Bop was jazz innovator Miles Davis' final studio album, which would have marked the beginning of the artist's turn to hip-hop-oriented tracks. However, Davis died on September 28, 1991, at which time only six tunes for the album had been completed...
(1992) - Grammy AwardGrammy AwardA Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...
for Best Large Jazz Ensemble Performance for Miles & Quincy Live at MontreuxMiles & Quincy Live at MontreuxMiles & Quincy Live at Montreux is a Miles Davis collaboration with Quincy Jones for the 1991 Montreux Jazz Festival. For the first time in three decades, Davis returned to the songs arranged by Gil Evans on such classic 1950s albums as Miles Ahead, Porgy and Bess and Sketches of Spain...
(1993) - Hollywood Walk of FameHollywood Walk of FameThe Hollywood Walk of Fame consists of more than 2,400 five-pointed terrazzo and brass stars embedded in the sidewalks along fifteen blocks of Hollywood Boulevard and three blocks of Vine Street in Hollywood, California...
Star (February 19, 1998) - Rock and Roll Hall of FameRock and Roll Hall of FameThe Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum is a museum located on the shore of Lake Erie in downtown Cleveland, Ohio, United States. It is dedicated to archiving the history of some of the best-known and most influential artists, producers, engineers and others who have, in some major way,...
Induction (March 13, 2006) - Hollywood's Rockwalk Induction (September 28, 2006)
- RIAA Quadruple PlatinumMusic recording sales certificationMusic recording sales certification is a system of certifying that a music recording has shipped or sold a certain number of copies, where the threshold quantity varies by type and by nation or territory .Almost all countries follow variations of the RIAA certification categories,...
for Kind of BlueKind of BlueKind of Blue is a studio album by American jazz musician Miles Davis, released August 17, 1959, on Columbia Records in the United States. Recording sessions for the album took place at Columbia's 30th Street Studio in New York City on March 2 and April 22, 1959... - St. Louis Walk of FameSt. Louis Walk of FameThe St. Louis Walk of Fame honors well-known people from St. Louis, Missouri, who made contributions to culture of the United States. All inductees were either born in the Greater St. Louis area or spent their formative or creative years there...
External links
Web sites dedicated to Miles Davis:- Miles Davis – official website.
- Miles Davis – official Sony Music website.
- Miles From India review