#milesdavis100 — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #milesdavis100, aggregated by home.social.
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#MilesDavis100 88/100
A tune that Miles Davis recorded early in quartet, for his 1953 *Blue Haze* album (maybe we should listen to this version as well, maybe tomorrow) and re-recorded later one only once, in 1956, with the first great quintet. One version is included in the *Cooking* album, merged with “Tune Up”. The version we are listening tonight comes from a recent release of all Prestige recordings.
When Lights Are Low.
The melody is melancholic and Miles Davis endorses the feeling. After a soulful chorus by John Coltrane on tenor saxophone, Red Garland gives a lighter mood to his piano chorus before Miles Davis retakes the melody once. Unfortunately, we have no choruses by Paul Chambers (bass) nor Philly Joe Jones (drums).
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#MilesDavis100 87/100
At the end of his career, Miles Davis made use of pop hits. Who would have imagined that Cindy Lauper's “Time after time” could be a pretext for a 9 minute collective improvisation? -
#MilesDavis100 86/100
Last version of Yesterdays, recorded Live at the Plugged Nickel in 1965 by Miles Davis's second great quartet.
This series of concerts, done during two days of December 1965, has one interesting history. As usual, Miles Davis's musicians traveled separately from him. Despite great innovation in the studio recordings, they found the live concerts a bit bland, with a recurring old repertoire. Tony Williams made the suggestion that they played everything differently: loud when they used to play low, and conversely. Of course, they didn't tell the master. This made great concerts and the tune Yesterdays, that used to last for 3 minutes or so, gives rise to a flow of improvisation of 14 minutes !
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#MilesDavis100 85/100
Still more Yesterdays. This is a short version recorded in 1957, in Stuttgart, with the Erwin Lehn Orchestra.
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#MilesDavis100 84/100
More Yesterdays. This version was recorded in New York City, 1952, and was included in the album *Young Man with a Horn*.
Jackie McLean is on alto saxophone, Oscar Pettiford on bass, Kenny Clarke on drums, Gil Coggins on piano, Jay Jay Johnson on trombone. -
#MilesDavis100 83/100
Yesterdays. We are going to listen to several versions of a beautiful ballad composed by Jerome Kern in 1933, in chronological order of their recordings (more or less).
This one was recorded in 1951 and had Lee Konitz on alto sax, Sal Mosca on piano, Billy Bauer on guitar, Arnold Fishkin on bass and Max Roach on drums.
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#MilesDavis100 82/100
Yesterday was Half Nelson. Today is Full Nelson ! It's a composition by Marcus Miller, from the 1986 recording *Tutu*, but I chose this version — recorded live in Osaka, in 1988 — because it has more energy — and is shorter. (We have Kenny Garrett on alto saxophone, Marilyn Mazur on percussions, Benny Rietveld and Foley on bass, Ricky Wellman on drums, and Adam Holzman, Robert Irving III on keyboards.)
The album was a tribute to Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and this tune is in honor of Nelson Mandela.
As all black musicians (and all black people) in America, Miles Davis suffered from racism all of his life. This is his contribution to the fight against apartheid. And this fight is not over.
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#MilesDavis100 81/100
In preparation for tomorrow's tune, a classic bebop composition by Miles Davis : Half Nelson. Recorded August 14, 1947.
Charlie Parker holds the alto saxophone, Nelson Boyd is on bass, John Lewis on piano, and Max Roach on drums.
Half Nelson is also a boxing figure, a sport Miles Davis was fond of. It was also the nickname of Boyd, the bass player, who was very short.
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#MilesDavis100 80/100
Still playing with sun/moon titles, here is a classic 1934 ballad that Miles Davis had played with Sarah Vaughan in 1949, but one can only hear him in the intro, within the horn section.
East of the sun (and west of the moon)
There is supposed to be another version, without vocals and possibly with Lucky Thompson on tenor, but I couldn't distinguish any trumpet playing in it !
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#MilesDavis100 79/100
Eclipses only last for a moment, and then the sun comes back.
Solar
This melody is due to Chuck Wayne but Miles Davis changed it to minor and got credit for the composition.
Dave Schildkraut offers a beautiful and smooth chorus on alto saxophone. Horace Silver is on piano, Percy Heath on bass and Kenny Clarke on drums. This was recorded in 1954. (Clarke spent the years 1951-1956 in New York City before he moved permanently to Paris. Then he played with Miles Davis when the trumpet player came to Europe.)
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#MilesDavis100 78/100
In honor of the true hero of the day, a 1954 recording from *Blue Haze*,
Old Devil Moon
With Horace Silver, Percy Heath and Art Blakey
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#MilesDavis100 77/100
Back to early recordings. 1951, with Sonny Rollins and Jackie McLean on tenor and alto saxophone, a composition of the latter : Dig.
Art Blakey is on drums, Walter Bishop on piano and Tommy Potter on bass. -
#MilesDavis100 76/100
A later version of Fran Dance, lived at San Francisco. Hank Mobley has replacedJohn Coltrane and Cannonball Adderley, Wynton Kelly has replaced Bill Evans. Jimmy Cobb and Paul Chambers are still there.
The first choruses are played rather straight, and Paul Chambers offers a very bluesy one. Miles Davis ends with a second chorus whose rhythm stays close to the melody but displaces the notes. Overall, maybe less imagination than the 1958 version, but still a nice one.
My regret is to haven't been able to find a version by the second great quintet...
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#MilesDavis100 75/100
This is Fran Dance, a beautiful ballad written by Miles Davis in honor of his wife Frances, recorded in 1958.
Miles Davis' chorus is simple and muses around the notes of the melody. Then Cannonball Adderley starts a remarkable reinterpretation of that melody, much denser but retaining the same lovely spirit. In comparison, John Coltrane offers something simpler, with longer notes, that hints at the initial melody. Then, Bill Evans's chorus removes almost all reference to the melody. At the end, Miles Davis gives another exposition of the theme, et voilà !
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#MilesDavis100 74/100
In honor of the south African archbishop Desmond Tutu who had received the 1984 Nobel prize for peace, in recognition for his anti-apartheid activism.
This is a composition by Marcus Miller, but I'm struck by the “davisian” sound of the first phrase on the trumpet.
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#MilesDavis100 73/100
A hit from *We want Miles*, a very simple melody with a French title (Davis had already used French to suggest exotism...) :
Jean-Pierre.That song is inspired from his formet wife Frances Taylor Durand singing the classic French lullaby “Dodo, l'enfant do... ” to her child who was named Jean-Pierre.
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#MilesDavis100 72/100
The main track from *Bitches Brew*, recorded August 1969.
It starts with 3 minutes of musical blasts, and then a groove emerges on top of which Miles Davis offers a chorus made of rather short phrases, some sober, some very dense. Below the groove is getting denser. At some point, the music more or less vanishes and the band starts a similar structure, with choruses by the other musicians.
In fact the track that we hear is a patchwork of many tracks, where Miles Davis conducted the band in the directions that their music led him to. The producer, Teo Macero, had had carte blanche to make consistent pieces from hours of recordings.
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#MilesDavis100 71/100
Next came “In a silent way”, from the 1969 album bearing the same title. We have two pianos (Chick Corea and Herbie Hancock), Josef Zawinul on organ (also the composer), Dave Holland on bass, John McLaughlin on electric guitar, Tony Williams on drums, Wayne Shorter on soprano saxophone.
The melody is simple and the group manages to build a wonderful musical tapestry around it.
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#MilesDavis100 70/100
The 5th piece Marcus Miller played in Marciac was “Hannibal”, from *Amandla*. This version is recorded live at Vienne, 1991, a few months before Miles Davis's death. Except for Kenny Garrett, who does a catchy chorus on alto saxophone, the other musicians can't move me a bit. This starts from the first notes on drums which are so uninteresting that I wonder whether they are played by synth and triggered by Miles Davis when he starts the piece.
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#MilesDavis100 69/100
From *Amandla*, this is “Catembe”.
Marcus Miller is playing all instruments here, except for trumpet of course, some saxophone (Kenny Garrett, he is playing the chorus at 3:23 ?) and percussions where we can hear Don Alias and Mino Cinelu.In some sense, this sounds like the opposite of Ascenseur pour l'échafaud where Miles brought a few ideas and led his fellow musicians to accompany him on the instant. Here, it seems that Miller brought a full track with already recorded keyboards, bass, voices (on keyboard?), bass clarinet and saxophones, and the other musicians. played on that track.
Catembe is a suburbian town near Maputo, the capital of Mozambique, and I wonder whether the piece is really built on that rhythm, for Miller and Alias and Cinelu hide it behind a strong rock feel. Anyway, enjoy!
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#MilesDavis100 68/100
I'm cheating today : the third piece of Miller's concert at Marciac was George Gershwin's “My Man's Gone Now”, of which Miles Davis proposed a jazz-rock version on *We Want Miles*. But I'll stream the 1958 version, from *Porgy and Bess*, arranged by Gil Evans.
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#MilesDavis100 67/100
Let's go on with the original versions of the tunes played by Marcus Miller's band at Marciac the other day.Still from *The Man with the Horn*, but this is a live version from 1982, at Montmartre (a jazz club in Copenhagen).
With Miles Davis on trumpet, we have Mino Cinelu on percussions, Al Foster on drums (watch his set!), Bill Evans on saxophone and flute, Marcus Miller on bass and Mike Stern on guitar.
The theme, “Fat Time”, is dedicated to Mike Stern who does an incredible chorus (and Miles Davis watches him with staring eyes). Oddly (and disturbingly), Stern was a bit fat at the time of the recording and Fat Time was the nickname that Davis gave him.
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#MilesDavis100 66/100
Beyond a few hits (Jean-Pierre, Tutu, Human nature…), I'm not at al familiar with the later musical recordings of Miles Davis. So I'll follow the suggestions of Marcus Miller in his recent Marciac concert and stream one song after another.
That concert, entitled *We want Miles*, the title of a 1982 recording by Miles Davis, was featuring several of his musical companions: Miller (on bass), Bill Evans (the saxophone player), Mike Stern (electric guitar).The concert started with Aida, from the 1981 recording *The Man With The Horn*.
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#MilesDavis100 65/100
We had already listened to another composition by Victor Feldman from that recording, on day 18, a composition that gave the album its title.
https://mathstodon.xyz/@antoinechambertloir/116738343867779312
Since this piece is so great (and dauntingly fast, I can't even dare playing it), here is a second version, recorded live at Antibes Juan Les Pins, in July 1963. (I chose that one because I prefer Tony Williams's comping on the first exposition of the theme.)
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#MilesDavis100 64/100
The pianist Victor Feldman recorded just one album with Miles Davis but did not wish to enter the band. Nevertheless he brought one composition that stayed in Davis's repertoire.
Joshua
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#MilesDavis100 63/100
A piece recorded in 1963. That's a classic blues but Miles Davis makes a completely new music out of it.
Basin Street Blues
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#MilesDavis100 62/100
More Zawinul.
This piece, Recollections, is terribly peaceful, the melody is overly simple, and it is repeated over and over, and the matter of playing it is to release the energy progressively so that the listeners remain interested all these 20 minutes. -
#MilesDavis100 61/100
When Davis hired Joe Zawinul for Bitches brew, he immediately asked him for some compositions.
Pharaoh's Dance
The pulsation has definitely abandoned that of the swing era.
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#MilesDavis100 60/100
From Nefertiti, another composition by Herbie Hancock: Riot
As for Madness, this kind of composition departs from the traditional forms of jazz song. This is just 8 bars with essentially one chord (Em, and Eb in the choruses), a syncopated left hand, and nice riffs on horns.
Hancock would record a quieter version of it the year after, for Speak like a child, still with Ron Carter on bass.