Category Archives: Jazz

Jazz, Miles Davis, Music Calendar

Today: Miles Davis passed away in 1991 22 years ago

miles-davis

“Don’t play what’s there; play what’s not there.”
― Miles Davis

“Good music is good no matter what kind of music it is.”
― Miles Davis

From Wikipedia:

Birth name Miles Dewey Davis III
Born May 26, 1926
Alton, Illinois, United States
Died September 28, 1991 (aged 65)
Santa Monica, California, United States
Genres Jazz, hard bop, bebop, cool jazz, modal, fusion, third stream, jazz-funk, jazz rap
Occupations Bandleader, composer, trumpeter, artist
Instruments Trumpet, flugelhorn, piano,organ
Years active 1944–1975, 1980–1991
Labels Capitol Jazz/EMI,Columbia/CBS, Warner Bros.Dial Records
Associated acts Billy Eckstine, Charlie Parker,Miles Davis Quintet, Gil Evans
Website www.milesdavis.com

Miles Dewey Davis III (May 26, 1926 – September 28, 1991) 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.

Miles_Davis 2

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 December 15, 2009, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a symbolic resolution recognizing and commemorating the album Kind of Blue on its 50th anniversary, “honoring the masterpiece and reaffirming jazz as a national treasure.”

 From allmusic.com – William Ruhlmann:

Throughout a professional career lasting 50 years, Miles Davis played the trumpet in a lyrical, introspective, and melodic style, often employing a stemless Harmon mute to make his sound more personal and intimate. But if his approach to his instrument was constant, his approach to jazz was dazzlingly protean. To examine his career is to examine the history of jazz from the mid-’40s to the early ’90s, since he was in the thick of almost every important innovation and stylistic development in the music during that period, and he often led the way in those changes, both with his own performances and recordings and by choosing sidemen and collaborators who forged new directions. It can even be argued that jazz stopped evolving when Davis wasn’t there to push it forward.
… read more over @ allmusic.com 

So What:

Legacy, influence & awards:

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 Blue is the best-selling album in the history of jazz music. On November 5, 2009, Rep. John Conyers of Michigan sponsored a measure in the United States House of Representatives to recognize and commemorate the album 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.

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.

All Blues – 1964:

  • Winner; Down Beat Reader’s Poll Best Trumpet Player 1955
  • Winner; Down Beat Reader’s Poll Best Trumpet Player 1957
  • Winner; Down Beat Reader’s Poll Best Trumpet Player 1961
  • Grammy Award for Best Jazz Composition Of More Than Five Minutes Duration for Sketches of Spain (1960)
  • Grammy Award for Best Jazz Performance, Large Group Or Soloist With Large Group for Bitches Brew (1970)
  • Grammy Award for Best Jazz Instrumental Performance, Soloist for We Want Miles (1982)
  • Sonning Award for Lifetime Achievement In Music (1984; Copenhagen, Denmark)
  • Doctor of Music, honoris causa (1986; New England Conservatory)
  • Grammy Award for Best Jazz Instrumental Performance, Soloist for Tutu (1986)
  • Grammy Award for Best Jazz Instrumental Performance, Soloist for Aura (1989)
  • Grammy Award for Best Jazz Instrumental Performance, Big Band for Aura (1989)
  • Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award (1990)
  • Australian Film Institute Award for Best Original Music Score for Dingo, shared with Michel Legrand (1991)
  • Knight of the Legion of Honor (July 16, 1991; Paris)
  • Grammy Award for Best R&B Instrumental Performance for Doo-Bop (1992)
  • Grammy Award for Best Large Jazz Ensemble Performance for Miles & Quincy Live at Montreux (1993)
  • Hollywood Walk of Fame Star (February 19, 1998)
  • Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction (March 13, 2006)
  • Hollywood’s Rockwalk Induction (September 28, 2006)
  • RIAA Quadruple Platinum for Kind of Blue
  • St. Louis Walk of Fame

I know what I’ve done for music, but don’t call me a legend. Just call me Miles Davis.

Album of the day: ‘Round Midnight (1956):

 

Other September 27:

Continue reading Today: Miles Davis passed away in 1991 22 years ago →

Jazz, Music Calendar

Today: Horace Silver is 85

Horace_Silver

Jazz is not background music. You must concentrate upon it in order to get the most of it. You must absorb most of it. The harmonies within the music can relax, soothe, relax, and uplift the mind when you concentrate upon and absorb it. Jazz music stimulates the minds and uplifts the souls of those who play it was well as of those who listen to immerse themselves in it. As the mind is stimulated and the soul uplifted, this is eventually reflected in the body.
~Horace Silver

“We all have to open our minds, stretch forth, take chances and venture out musically to try and arrive at something new and different.”
~Horace Silver

Song For My Father – Live – Denmark TV 1968:

From Wikipedia:

Birth name Horace Ward Martin Tavares Silva
Born September 2, 1928 (age 85)
Origin Norwalk, Connecticut, U.S.
Genres Post bop
Modal jazz
Mainstream jazz
Soul jazz
Jazz fusion
Hard bop
Occupations Pianist
Composer
Bandleader
Instruments Piano
Associated acts Horace Silver Quintet
Horace Silver Trio
Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers

Horace Silver (born September 2, 1928), born Horace Ward Martin Tavares Silva in Norwalk, Connecticut, is an American jazz pianist and composer.

Silver is known for his distinctive humorous and funky playing style and for his pioneering compositional contributions to hard bop. He was influenced by a wide range of musical styles, notably gospel music, African music, and Latin American music and sometimes ventured into the soul jazz genre.

From allmusic (Chris Kelsey):

From the perspective of the early 2000s, it is clear that few jazz musicians have had a greater impact on the contemporary mainstream than Horace Silver. The hard bop style that Silver pioneered in the ’50s is now dominant, played not only by holdovers from an earlier generation, but also by fuzzy-cheeked musicians who had yet to be born when the music fell out of critical favor in the ’60s and ’70s. … read more -> allmusic.com

From allaboutjazz.com:

When Horace Silver once wrote out his rules for musical composition (in the liner notes to the 1968 record, Serenade to a Soul Sister), he expounded on the importance of “meaningful simplicity.” The pianist could have just as easily been describing his own life. For more than fifty years, Silver has simply written some of the most enduring tunes in jazz while performing them in a distinctively personal style. It’s all been straight forward enough, while decades of incredible experiences have provided the meaning. .. read more -> allaboutjazz.com

Legacy:

Silver’s music has been a major force in modern jazz. He was one of the first pioneers of the style known as hard bop, influencing such pianists as Bobby Timmons, Les McCann, and Ramsey Lewis. Second, the instrumentation of his quintet (trumpet, tenor sax, piano, double bass, and drums) served as a model for small jazz groups from the mid-1950s until the late 1960s. Further, Silver’s ensembles provided an important training ground for young players, many of whom (such as Donald Byrd, Art Farmer, Blue Mitchell,Woody Shaw, Junior Cook, and Joe Henderson) later led similar groups of their own.

Silver’s talent did not go unnoticed among rock musicians who bore jazz influences, either; Steely Dan sent Silver into the Top 40 in the early 1970s when they crafted their biggest hit single, “Rikki, Don’t Lose That Number,” off the bass riff that opens “Song for My Father.”

As social and cultural upheavals shook the nation during the late 1960s and early 1970s, Silver responded to these changes through music. He commented directly on the new scene through a trio of records called United States of Mind (1970–1972) that featured the spirited vocals of Andy Bey. The composer got deeper into cosmic philosophy as his group, Silver ‘N Strings, recorded Silver ‘N Strings Play The Music of the Spheres (1979).

Señor Blues (Horace Silver, Blue Mitchell & Junior Cook):

Album of the day

Song For My Father (1964):

Read review @ allaboutjazz.com

Other September-02:

Continue reading Today: Horace Silver is 85 →

Jazz, Music Calendar

Today: The late Charlie Parker was born in 1920 – 93 years ago

Charlie_Parker,_Tommy_Potter,_Miles_Davis,_Max_Roach

You’ve got to learn your instrument. Then, you practice, practice, practice. And then, when you finally get up there on the bandstand, forget all that and just wail.
~Charlie Parker

I realized by using the high notes of the chords as a melodic line, and by the right harmonic progression, I could play what I heard inside me. That’s when I was born.
~Charlie Parker

All the things you are:

From Wikipedia:

Birth name Charles Parker, Jr.
Also known as Bird, Yardbird,
Zoizeau (in France)
Born August 29, 1920
Kansas City, Kansas, United States
Died March 12, 1955 (aged 34)
New York City, New York, United States
Genres Jazz, bebop
Occupations Saxophonist, Composer
Instruments Alto saxophone, tenor saxophone
Years active 1937–1955
Labels Savoy, Dial, Verve
Associated acts Miles Davis, Max Roach

Charles Parker, Jr. (August 29, 1920 – March 12, 1955), also known as Yardbird and Bird,was an American jazz saxophonist and composer.

Parker acquired the nickname “Yardbird” early in his careerand the shortened form, “Bird”, which continued to be used for the rest of his life, inspired the titles of a number of Parker compositions, such as “Yardbird Suite”, “Ornithology”, “Bird Gets the Worm”, and “Bird of Paradise.”

Parker was a highly influential jazz soloist and a leading figure in the development of bebop, a form of jazz characterized by fast tempos, virtuosic technique, and improvisation. Parker introduced revolutionary harmonic ideas, including rapid passing chords, new variants of altered chords, and chord substitutions. His tone ranged from clean and penetrating to sweet and somber. Many Parker recordings demonstrate virtuosic technique and complex melodic lines, sometimes combining jazz with other musical genres, including blues, Latin, and classical.

Parker was an icon for the hipster subculture and later the Beat Generation, personifying the jazz musician as an uncompromising artist and intellectual, rather than an entertainer.

charlie-parker-yardbird

Music is your own experience, your own thoughts, your wisdom. If you don’t live it, it won’t come out of your horn. They teach you there’s a boundary line to music. But, man, there’s no boundary line to art.
~Charlie Parker

From allmusic.com – Scott Yanow:

One of a handful of musicians who can be said to have permanently changed jazz, Charlie Parker was arguably the greatest saxophonist of all time. He could play remarkably fast lines that, if slowed down to half speed, would reveal that every note made sense. “Bird,” along with his contemporaries Dizzy Gillespie and Bud Powell, is considered a founder of bebop; in reality he was an intuitive player who simply was expressing himself. Rather than basing his improvisations closely on the melody as was done in swing, he was a master of chordal improvising, creating new melodies that were based on the structure of a song. In fact, Bird wrote several future standards (such as “Anthropology,” “Ornithology,” “Scrapple from the Apple,” and “Ko Ko,” along with such blues numbers as “Now’s the Time” and “Parker’s Mood”) that “borrowed” and modernized the chord structures of older tunes. Parker’s remarkable technique, fairly original sound, and ability to come up with harmonically advanced phrases that could be both logical and whimsical were highly influential. By 1950, it was impossible to play “modern jazz” with credibility without closely studying Charlie Parker. Read more -> allmusic.com

I’ve Got Rhythm:

Album of the day – The Greatest Jazz Concert Ever (1953):

Various-Jazz+-+The+Greatest+Jazz+Concert+Ever

Other August-29:

Continue reading Today: The late Charlie Parker was born in 1920 – 93 years ago →

Great albums, Jazz, John Coltrane, Miles Davis

Today: Miles Davis released Kind of Blue in 1959 – 54 years ago

1 Comment

kind-of-blue

“It must have been made in heaven.”
– Jimmy Cobb

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. The sessions featured Davis’s ensemble sextet, which consisted of pianist Bill Evans (Wynton Kelly on one track), drummer Jimmy Cobb, bassist Paul Chambers, and saxophonists John Coltrane and Julian “Cannonball” Adderley.

Though precise figures have been disputed, Kind of Blue has been described by many music writers not only as Davis’s best-selling album, but as the best-selling jazz record of all time. On October 7, 2008, it was certified quadruple platinum in sales by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). It has been regarded by many critics as the greatest jazz album of all time and Davis’s masterpiece.

milesdavis2

The album’s influence on music, including jazz, rock, and classical music, has led music writers to acknowledge it as one of the most influential albums ever made. In 2002, it was one of fifty recordings chosen that year by the Library of Congress to be added to the National Recording Registry. In 2003, the album was ranked number 12 on Rolling Stone magazine’s list of the 500 greatest albums of all time.

A Quartet In The Studio

Kind of Blue was recorded in two sessions at Columbia Records’ 30th Street Studio in New York City. On March 2, the tracks “So What”, “Freddie Freeloader”, and “Blue in Green” were recorded for side one of the original LP, and on April 22 the tracks “All Blues”, and “Flamenco Sketches” were recorded, making up side two. Production was handled by Teo Macero, who had produced Davis’s previous two LPs, and Irving Townsend.

miles davis4

TV performance from 1959, incredible archival footage where Miles Davis and his Quintette play So What from Kind of Blue:

Kind of Blue isn’t merely an artistic highlight for Miles Davis, it’s an album that towers above its peers, a record generally considered as the definitive jazz album, a universally acknowledged standard of excellence. Why does Kind of Blue posses such a mystique? Perhaps because this music never flaunts its genius… It’s the pinnacle of modal jazz — tonality and solos build from the overall key, not chord changes, giving the music a subtly shifting quality… It may be a stretch to say that if you don’t like Kind of Blue, you don’t like jazz — but it’s hard to imagine it as anything other than a cornerstone of any jazz collection.
—Stephen T. Erlewine (allmusic)

Track listing:
All songs written and composed by Miles Davis except where noted 

1. “So What”
2. “Freddie Freeloader”
3. “Blue in Green” (Miles Davis and Bill Evans)
4. “All Blues”
5. “Flamenco Sketches” (Miles Davis and Bill Evans)

Musicians


Miles Davis – Kind of Blue 50th Anniversary:

 

1959 – The Year that changed Jazz.
A very good documentary from BBC.   Four absolutely canonical LPs were recorded that year: Kind of Blue by Miles Davis; Time Out by Dave Brubeck; Mingus Ah Um by Charles Mingus; and The Shape of Jazz to Come by Ornette Coleman. Good interviews and great music:

Album of the day:

Other August-17:

Continue reading Today: Miles Davis released Kind of Blue in 1959 – 54 years ago →

Jazz, Music Calendar, Soul

Today: Mavis Staples is 74 – Happy Birthday

3 Comments

Mavis Staples
Mavis Staples  was born July 10, 1939 in Chicago, Illinois she is an American rhythm and blues and gospel singer, actress and civil rights activist who recorded with The Staple Singers, her family’s band.

The Staple Singers were an American gospel, soul, and R&B singing group. Roebuck “Pops” Staples (1914–2000), the patriarch of the family, formed the group with his children Cleotha (1934–2013), Pervis (b. 1935), Yvonne (b. 1936), and Mavis (b. 1939). They are best known for their 1970s hits “Respect Yourself”, “I’ll Take You There”, “If You’re Ready (Come Go with Me)”, and “Let’s Do It Again”.

Biography from Allmusic (Rob Bowman):

She first recorded solo for Stax subsidiary Volt in 1969. Subsequent efforts included a Curtis Mayfield-produced soundtrack on Curtom, a disappointing nod to disco for Warner in 1979, a misguided stab at electro-pop with Holland-Dozier-Holland in 1984, and an uneven album for Paisley Park. Staples has a rich contralto voice that has neither the range of Aretha Franklin nor the power of Patti LaBelle. Her otherworldly power comes instead from a masterful command of phrasing and a deep-seated sensuality expressed through timbre manipulation.

Both the Staple Singers andMavis found fresh audiences stemming from their participation on the CD Rhythm Country and Blues, and in 1996 she issued Spirituals & Gospel: Dedicated to Mahalia Jackson. Her next recording project didn’t land for another eight years, although Have a Little Faith on Alligator became her highest-profile release in years. We’ll Never Turn Back appeared three years later in 2007.

Staples teamed up with Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy as producer for 2010’s You Are Not Alone, which won the 2011 Grammy Award in the category of Best Americana Album. One True Vine, released in 2013, was also produced by Tweedy and featured a mix of old and new songs written by the likes of George Clinton, Alan Sparhawk (Low), and Nick Lowe.

Mavis Staples with Jeff Tweedy

The Weight – The Band with The Staple Singers (from The Last Waltz):

Album of Today is Mavis’ fantastic new record, One True Vine:
one true vine

Other 10 July:
Continue reading Today: Mavis Staples is 74 – Happy Birthday →