- 1926 -– 1991
- A Thumbnail Bio
- By SABA
Do
you recall the first time you heard a trumpet composition, became mesmerized
by it, then discovered it was written and performed by Miles? The first time
for me was as a near teenager in the late sixties. My father had built a great
sound system, one of those full of tube relics and great warm & rich
sounds with homemade speakers. We were dialing up and own the FM channels and
stumbled upon the local jazz station. Though he could not explain why he liked
the music of Miles Davis, it was not a mystery, so smooth, the music, soft and
melodic. This was the time when Miles was at his traditional best; no one
could have understood why he’d depart from the rich music of that time
period. But then again, not many people really knew Miles Davis.
Davis was born in Alton, Illinois, in May of 1926; which may have been another reason my father liked him, they were born in the same year! He was raised in an upper middle class family in East St. Louis. His first trumpet was gift at age 13 from his dentist dad. Soon thereafter he was gigging with Eddie Randall’s Blue Devils. For Miles this was a time period of great safety and learning. And at age 16, he received the thrill of his young life and an insight into what his future path might become. The Billy Eckstine Orchestra was passing through St. Louis when the bands trumpet player took ill and a replacement needed to be found. Playing with Eckstine was none other than Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker and soon it featured the debut of young Miles. For two weeks Miles hung with the Bird and Diz. Soon thereafter he was ticketed and bound for the Julliard School of Music in New York City.
In his autobiography, Davis describes the first two weeks of his NYC and Julliard experience. For those parents who are sending off your children to college, it is the fright that you have on that first night apart; for Miles spent the first two weeks and his first month’s allowance chasing after Charlie Parker! He would room with Parker for a year and during that year he’d follow Bird down to 52nd Street and every night write down the chords that Bird played. The next day he’d play the chords all day in practice rooms at Julliard, instead of going to classes. This practice was how Miles, the signature Davis sound began to take shape.
About a year into the tutorial from Bird, Bird decides to move out to California with Dizzy Gillespie. Miles followed a few months later by travelling cross-country with Benny Carter’s Orchestra. He recorded with Parker in California and when Bird formed a quintet in NYC the following year, Miles was a member. In 1948, 4 years after striking it out to Julliard, Miles was out on his own, with arrangements that would usher in the era of "cool jazz". Miles would frequently play the flugelhorn and muted trumpet to create a soft sound, one that did not penetrate too much. He’d say, "to play soft you have to relax… you don’t delay the beat, but you might play a quarter triplet against four beats, and that sounds delayed… I always wanted to play with a light sound, because I could think better when I played that way". Now read what Jackie McLean wrote about Miles’ rich middle register overtones, " crisp and/or cooing, crooning, muted or mewling, fierce as though shredding complacency or tender as a man treading on eggshells". Miles was a 360 degree jazz-man!
The breakout year for Miles was 1955. His performance of "Round Midnite" at the Newport Jazz Festival was a shot heard round the jazz world. This came a year after he kicked a vicious heroin habit and re-committed himself to full time play again. In October 1955, Miles and John Coltrane began the first of their recording sessions for Columbia. These recordings over the next six years can be heard on a spectacular upcoming release from Columbia Legacy records. To be released to stores in April 2000, this six disk pack contains over 90 minutes of new music, and covers the classic LP’s such as Kind of Blue, "Round about Midnite, Milestones and Someday My Prince Will Come. Be sure to look for this if you are a Miles fan, it is not to be missed! The decade of the 50’s ended in a strange way for Miles. In New York City, in a bizarre twist of unrelated events Miles was arrested and beaten by the New York City police. Davis took out a lawsuit, which he then subsequently dropped. It marked the end of a decade and music style for Miles. He remained the leading jazz innovator with his spare style of play.
If Miles had retired in 1960, he would still be famous in jazz history. But true to the adage, "if it can be labeled, it’s outdated", Miles made changes. During the 60’s, with such sidemen and composers as Wayne Sorter and Herbie Hancock, Miles progressively made use of melodic inventiveness with Shorter’s winding compositions and Hancock’s use of tension. From here he moved to bridge a gap between jazz and rock and dove into fusion. The break to fusion and rock employed the use of electronically amplified and studio manipulated sounds, giving Miles new toys to play with like delay and echo devices. In this period, Miles idea of sound comprised of the use of extended searching vamps with primitive rhythms and abstract melodies. Chick Corea would describe the sets from Bitches Brew as follows, "one improv, from beginning to end with a few cues from Miles to change the tempo or the key".
Davis’ influences in the late 60’s and early 70’s were a variety of recording artists including Jimi Hendrix and Sly Stone. Miles moved from jazz, to fusion, to an electric concoction of bubbling funk, explosive rock and abrasive jazz. Yeah, it upset the jazz purists. Most likely upset my Pops as well! No more soft sounds, no more spare style. Yet, he opened up a new audience for his music, rock fans. Bitches Brew, mentioned above sold over 400,000 copies in a year, making it among the biggest selling jazz albums in history!
In 1975 Miles retired after a series of personal upheavals including a car crash, drug problems, a shooting incident, more police harassment, and eventual arrest. He was in bad health and in his autobiography indicates clearly that he was very much into recreational drugs. Would Miles come back? In 1981, Miles recorded "The Man with the Horn". In his comeback he was asked if his technique was back, he replied, "If I can play a low F sharp, loud and clear, then I know my tone is there. I had to work real hard to get that tone back; it took me two years to get it right. Now that it’s back, I’m gonna keep it".
During his final years Miles settled into a comfortable pattern of touring and recording, where he was able to dictate his own pace of life. He turned to painting, and is viewed to be a great artistic painter. Known for clashing shapes, explosive color and historical motifs, the style resembled post-modernism artists of Milan, Italy.
Miles Davis had a great artistic gift for painting and creating music. Regardless of the time period, 40’s through 80’s Miles was refreshing, irreverent, a catalyst, a bridge builder, a magician with notes. He is one of the very few jazz musicians who had the ability to improvise and swing at a constant tempo. He was soulful and he was honest to his character. His autobiography is a great read about a great American talent. Even though Miles passed on in 1991, his music, his theory of music continues to impact the contemporary music world.