In the life of Miles Davis the year 1955 saw the first version or incarnation of the Miles Davis Quintet. In this band there were featured some of the biggest names in jazz of the time such as John Coltrane, red Garland, Paul Chambers and Philly Joe Jones.

It must be said that in the world of jazz this was new stuff and did not move along the lines of the rhythmic and harmonic complexity of the then prevalent bebop. It was a progression towards modal jazz where Davis was allowed to play long, legato, melodic lines. The pianist Ahmad Jamal played a role in the formation of this style at around this time because Davis was strongly influenced by his sparse style which contrasted strongly with the busy sound of bebop.

In 1955 Davis was still under contract to Pretige Records at this time but due to a contract arrangement made the first recordings for this group at Columbia records. The new music was released on the album ‘Round About Midnight. This was followed by the product of two days of recording in 1956 which was released as; Relaxin’ and with the Miles Davis Quintet, Streamin’ with the Miles Davis Quintet, Workin’ with the Miles Davis Quintet and cookin’ with the Miles Davis quintet.

In all this quintet amounted to a very productive collaboration but it was never stable. The problem of drugs was never really far away and several of the other members of the group used heroin which caused the band to disband in the early months of 1957. It must be said here that following this, in 1958 the quintet reformed as a sextet but this time with the addition of Julian “Cannonball” Adderley and subsequently recorded “Milestones”.

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But first, and later on in 1955 Davis traveled again to France but this time it was too composed the score to Louis Malle’s Ascenseur pour l’Échafaud. In this work he recorded the soundtrack entirely with the aid of French session musicians which included Barney Wilen, Pierre Michelot, Rene’ Urtreger and the American drummer Kenny Clarke.

Returning to America and later on in the 1950s and early 1960s Davis started a period of outstanding and diverse creativity in collaboration with the noted jazz musician Gil Evans. These two artists recorded a series of albums together which saw Davis often playing flugelhorn as well as trumpet.  The first product of the sessions was an album called “Miles Ahead” and showcased Davis’ playing with at jazz big-band, the horn section beautifully arranged by Evans.

The pieces that were produced at this time included music by Dave Brubeck and Leo Delibes and the sessions were notable because they included Davis’ first piece of European classical music. This was important and innovative stuff for the time notably because of its editing which in joining the tracks together created a seamless musical experience between each side of the album.

During this period also and in 1958 Davis and Evans recorded Porgy and Bess. This was a great recording which consisted of an arrangement of pieces from George Gershwin’s opera of the same name and featured members of Davis’ band such as Paul Chambers, Cannonball Adderley and Philly Joe Jones.  Davis himself said that this album was one of his favorites.

In 1959 the atmospheric and now famous “Sketches of Spain” was recorded. These were evocative and beautiful pieces of music, by and large arranged by Gil Evans and some of which recorded at a concert in Orchestra under Evans direction. This was all about Spain and the embodiment of the feel and soul of Spain. These Recordings were a spirited interpretation of the music of two of Spain’s most gifted contemporary composers; Joaquin Rodrigo and  Manuel de Falla as well as and including Gil Evans originals with a Spanish theme.

Davis’ collaboration with Gil Evans would go on for most of Davis’s life but 1962 was the last year in which they created a full album together. Throughout the two men had a great deal of respect and friendship for each other. In his autobiography Davis noted ;”….. my best friend is Gil Evans”.

The next stage and Miles Davis’s life can be summed up in the three words “Kind of Blue”.

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The first major development in the life of Miles Davis was when he started started his recording career in 1945 in New York City. Initially he was heavily under the influence of Charlie Parker, becoming a member of  his unofficial quintet and appearing on many of Parker’s originative bebop recordings in the autumn of that year .

In Davis’ very first recordings he was accompanied by tenor saxophonist Herby fields and the blues singer Rubberlegg Williams. It was early days as yet though and Davis, although already having a distinctive style lacked confidence and his technique needed development. He was known to play his notes somewhat throttled at times and he would stumble in his solos now and then.

This novice segment in his career would not last that long because by 1948 he was beginning to flower as a solo artist. He had now served his apprenticeship on stage and record as a sideman and began to work with a nonet which is, for those who are not familiar with the name a piece of music or group for nine instruments or voices. Unusually for the time, this particular nonet featured the French horn and tuba, primarily played by Davis himself.

After a number of gigs at New York’s Royal roost the group were signed by Capitol records and recorded several singles that were released in 1949 in 1950. These Recordings featured arrangements by Gerry Mulligan, John Lewis and Gil Evans. Davis found at this time a productive collaboration with Gil Evans which would continue over the next 20 years on many of his major works. The recordings produced at this time saw little use until 1957 until they were released as the album the “birth of the cool”.

The year 1949 saw the artists first visit to Europe where he performed in the Paris Jazz Festival in May of that year. This visit was to prove seminal in Davis’ life if for no other reason than the fact that to the French they had become something of a cult. The experience of this cult status was so different then he was used to in America that it affected him strongly, so much so that Davis dated his problems with narcotics from this point on. Returning to America Davis now found himself, while playing in the jazz clubs of New York, in frequent contact with people who used and sold narcotics and like many at the time became a heroin addict. 

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Between 1950 and 55 Davis mainly recorded as a leader in a variety of small group settings.  Included were sideman such as Sonny Rollands, John Lewis, Kenny Clarke, Jack McLean, Art Blakey, Horace Silver, Thelonious Monk, J.J. Johnson, Percy Heath, Milt Jackson and Charles Mingus. It was a productive time but Davis was now a heroin addict and because of that he became unreliable and developed a reputation for unreliability.

It was a big problem and his solution was to return to St. Louis where, in the winter of 1953 - 54 he locked himself in a guest room. This was in his father’s farm and lasted for 12 days until the drug was out of his system. It is notable that during this period he did have help with his addiction from the famous boxer sugar Ray Robinson.

After this and in 1954 after going clean, Davis made a series of important recordings which were eventually collected on albums including; Walkin’, Bags’ Groove and Miles Davis and the Modern Jazz Giants. One other very important development did occur in 1954 which must be made note of and that was that Davis started to use the Harmon mute. 

For those who are not familiar with the term the Harmon mute is a trumpeter’s device that darkens and subdues the trumpet sound. If you have ever seen Davis or many other trumpeters in concert you will have seen him using this device in front of his trumpet. You could not help but notice the distinctive muted trumpet tone that it creates. It was this tone that would be associated with Davis for the rest of his life.

The next stage in his life would begin from 1955 and on where he would again be thrust into the jazz spotlight and this would include associations with the Newport Jazz Festival, Thelonious Monk and the formation of his first quintet.

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Life of Miles Davis started in Alton Illinois where he was born to a relatively affluent family.  Dr. Miles Davis, his father, was a dentist who moved the family to East St. Louis in 1927.  In all, it could only be considered a relatively privileged life.  For instance, there could not have been many children in his time and place who had the advantage of a substantial family ranch, in northern Arkansas, as did Davis where as a boy he learned to ride horses.

From an early age Miles’ mother, Cleota Mae Davis, wanted Miles to play piano as she was a very good blues pianist herself, a fact she kept hidden from her son.  Davis’s father however had other ideas and when Miles was 13 his father gave him a new trumpet and arranged lessons for him with the local music teacher.

You could say that Miles Davis’ career as a trumpeter was someone due to serendipity because as Davis was later to suggest, his father’s choice of instrument was made largely to provoke his wife who disliked the instrument.  Davis’ instructor Buchanan could in a sense, also be considered serendipitous because unlike the fashion of the time he stressed the importance of playing without vibrato.  It was this which informed Davis’ playing and his clear signature tone throughout his life.

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By way of enforcement Buchanan would slap Davis’ knuckles every time he started using heavy vibrato.  In time the way of playing his trumpet without vibrato became very important to his signature sound to the point where he once remarked;”I prefer the round sound with no attitude in it, like around voice with not too much tremolo and not too much baseline bass.  Just right in the middle.  If I can’t get that sound I can’t play anything.”

Davis was a member of the musicians union by the age of 16 and when not at school was working professionally.  During the following year and at the age of 17 he played with the bandleader Eddie Randles’ Blue Devils. At this time another early and important influence came in the form of the musicians Clark Terry and Sonny Stitt who tried to persuade him to join the tiny Bradshaw band that was then passing through town.  However, this was at yet not to be because Davis’s mother felt it more important that he finished his final year of high school.

In these early days Davis’s parents were both very insistent on his continuing formal academic studies.  But for this, Davis would’ve been on the road with the Billy Eckstine band which had visited St. Louis in 1944.  Already in the band were Dizzy Gillespie and Davis was taken on his third trumpet for a couple of weeks because of the illness of Buddy Anderson.  When the band left town Davis had no choice but to stay behind and continue his studies.

These same studies would take him to New York City and  a scholarship at the Juilliard school of music.  Study however, became secondary because in New York he found Charlie Parker and the next step in his career.

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In terms of the life of Miles Davis it seems inconceivable that there are those who don’t know who Miles Davis was but for those who don’t here are some of the basics of his life; Miles Davis, an American jazz trumpeter, composer and bandleader was considered probably one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century.

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So who was Miles Davis?  Well, for one he was a musician who consistently held the position of being at the forefront of just about every major development in jazz from World War II to the 1990’s.  Initially, he joined in on various early bebop records and then went on to record one of the first cool jazz records. 

You could say Miles Davis was cool jazz.  Add to this that at least in part, he was responsible for most of the major developments in jazz such as modal jazz and jazz fusion which came about from his work with other musicians in the late 60s and early 70s.

In America there has been a great tradition of jazz trumpeter’s beginning with Buddy Bolden and then continuing on with the musicians such as Joe “King” Oliver, Louis Armstrong, Roy Eldridge, and Dizzy Gillespie.  Davis was very much a part of that tradition although the way he went about it was much different.  His contribution could not be said to be based on his technical ability, which was not as great as his predecessors but rather, on his style.

As a matter of fact It could be said that his distinctive and influential style was his greatest achievement as a musician.  It was this unique style that existed both in the playing of his own instrument and the work of his bands in which some of the most important jazz musicians of the latter part of the 20th century made their names. It was this above all else that changed the face of jazz forever.

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