I am just looking for info on any recordings that Prince might have done with Miles Davis. Thanx

All what I do know is that they shared a stage in a Paisley Park show around 87. I think I once read in an interview with P that he and Miles worked together on a track (or several tracks); they did that with exchanging tapes or so.

All I know is that I'd love to have the painting Miles did for Prince that's hanging in Paisley Park...it's some serious shit. It's just Prince's name, but the colors and scheme are pretty wild.

THE WHOLE MILES DAVIS & PRINCE THING:

1986:
Prince recorded the basic tracks for "Can I Play With U" and sent them to Miles and his band to finish. The track was going to be released on Miles's Tutu album but was pulled at the last moment (apparently because Prince didn't think his song was up to scratch with the rest of the Tutu material).

Prince attended Miles's 60th birthday party in NY.

1987:
Miles guested on stage for the New Years Eve benefit concert at Paisley Park. He played 5 min solo on "Beautiful Night". The show is widely circulating on bootleg (Miles At The Park).

1988:
Miles overdubed a trumpet solo on a Prince/Chaka Khan collaboration "Sticky Wicked" released on Chaka's CK album (they were never in the studio together though).

Miles is interviewed for Albert Magnoli's Prince Portrait documentary.

1988-91
Miles played a few Prince covers, "Movie Star" and "Penetration", at many of his gigs.

1991:
Miles died and Prince announced that his next album would feature a 20 min section devoted to Miles. Nothing more has ever been heard about this project, however the silent track on Rave Un2 The Joy Fantastic is said to be in memory of Miles.

Although there are plenty of other rumors about recording sessions and midnight jam sessions etc, this is the only confirmed stuff they ever did. Miles praises Prince many times in his autiobiography, and Prince has spoken many times in concert about his love for Miles's music.
[Edited 1/24/06 23:08pm]

There are also the tracks from Madhouse's first "24" album that Miles recorded in studio in 1991 (in Germany, if I remember correctly). I'll have to check this, but I think Miles started to work on three of the first four tracks. "Jailbait" was going to be released on "The Last Miles", as was "Can I Play With U?":

http://www.miles-beyond.c...cklist.htm

Prince stated in an interview circa 1997, that he is "oneday" going to release the music he recorded with Miles Davis. He described it being "quite free form" and containing "a lot of solos".

That’s Miles playing the trumpet solo at the end of “Adore”…..

Drkman said:

No it isn't.

There's supposed to be a "Crucial" collaboration they did together. I am dying to get a copy of that. If anyone know anything about that, please orgnote me.

The only "Crucial" collaboration they did is the song "Can I Play With U?" (called "Little Red Riding Hood" by Miles Davis in his autobiography) which appears on the bootleg LP titled "Crucial" (released a long time ago).

However some individuals have been suggesting that Prince wrote Miles Davis' song "Amandla", but went uncredited for it on the album of the same title. Miles had been reported to have said on the stage to the audience "here's something that Prince wrote" and then proceeded to play the track in question.

Novabreaker said:

That would be great if that's true... never heard this rumour before. Amandla is a damn fine song.

SenseOfDoubt said:

"Amandla" has nothing to do with Prince. It has been confirmed many times. This tune was composed by Marcus Miller. The only link with Prince is that the tune appeared (as "The H Man") on the "Crucial" bootleg. Usual stupid bootleger stuff...

As far as I know, the only times Miles announced tunes as being composed by Prince was when he played "Movie Star" and the tunes from Madhouse's second "24" album.

I don't think either Amandla is a Prince song, it doesn't sound like it. I think Miles might have played "Movie Star" or "Penetration" live and the story just changed along the way, probably because "The H Man" is on the "Crucial"-bootleg.

From the liner notes of the unreleased Miles Davis Warner Box set "The Last Word"

...In addition, another artist offered his services to Miles without being invited. Sometime in late 1985/early 1986, Miles received a package from Prince. According to Miles it contained a letter that read, “If this tape is of any use to you, please go ahead and play whatever you feel over it. Because I trust what you hear and play.” The enclosed track was called “Can I Play With U,” and consisted of some frantic playing and singing by Prince, with horn overdubs by Eric Leeds.


With a body of unrelated tracks in diverse styles accumulating, yet no clear focus in sight, the then head of the jazz division of Warner Bros., Tommy LiPuma, became concerned. LiPuma was a big-name producer who had worked with Barbra Streisand and George Benson, and he suggested to Miles that he produce the project. Perhaps becoming aware that producing wasn’t really his métier, Miles agreed to LiPuma’s involvement. The producer immediately steered things in a new direction. He’d heard the “Rubber Band” sessions, but concluded, “I wasn't too impressed with what I heard. I wanted to take a different direction.” This left only the Prince and Duke tracks as serious contenders for the new album. LiPuma wondered where he was going to get more material and found the answer in Marcus Miller, with whom he had already worked on David Sanborn/Bob James and George Benson/Earl Klugh albums, and who had played in Miles’s live band 1981-83...

LiPuma now had five tracks: one track by Prince and Duke each plus the three tracks by Marcus Miller. Since it was “Tutu” that had the greatest sense of hitting bull’s eye, LiPuma asked Miller to write additional similar material to fill out the album. In New York, with Jason Miles assisting on synthesizer programming, Miller wrote and recorded “Tomaas,” Don’t Lose Your Mind,” and “Full Nelson.” The latter, with its staccato, hiphop-like rhythm was deliberately designed by Miller to be “a bridge with the Prince track”—the title was a reference to both Miles’s 1950s song “Half Nelson,” and Prince’s last name, “Nelson.” Inspired by the success of Miles’s treatments of “Time After Time” and “Human Nature,” LiPuma had also been looking for a pop song to cover, but it was Miles himself who came up with Scritti Politti’s “Perfect Way,” and the idea that it was made the title song of the album.

LiPuma instead suggested calling the finished album Tutu. Prince was responsible for the omission of his track; apparently he felt that “Can I Play With U” did not fit with the rest of the music on the album. The playful, almost throwaway energy and lyrics of “Can I Play With U” are indeed of a very different nature than Miller’s material. Miller had taken his inspiration for his harmonies and arrangements from the voicings that Gil Evans had used on The Birth Of The Cool, and that Herbie Hancock had applied with the second great quintet. Combined with Miller’s eminently hummable melodies these roused Miles to some of his most lyrical and melodic playing since the 1960s...

Recuperating from the strains of touring in 1990, Miles was absent from the live stage from November 17, 1990 to March 13, 1991. He did, however, begin work on a new studio album during this period, which was to be his most ambitious for Warner yet. One of his aspirations was to engage with the latest black music, hiphop and rap. Matt Pierson, Warner’s current Head of Jazz, and at the time head of A&R, remarked, “Miles was planning a 2-CD set of urban music and funk and hip-hop and jazz. It was to contain collaborations with Prince, John Bigham, and two different hip-hop producers, Sid Reynolds and Easy Mo Bee.” ...

Although the planned collaboration between Miles and Prince came to nothing, Prince did send Miles eight instrumental compositions in the beginning of 1991. Miles played three of these, “Jail Bait,” “A Girl And Her Puppy,” and “Penetration,” during his 1991 tour. Some of these live performances found their way onto bootlegs, but what was hitherto unknown is that Miles went into the recording studio during the German leg of his 1991 tour, and laid down these three tunes with his live band. One of these recordings was complete enough to be mixed and released, and is included on this set. “Jail Bait” is a fine blues, with excellent solos by Miles and Deron Johnson on organ.

The magnificent “Penetration” is also included here, but taken from one of the two extraordinary retrospective concerts Miles played during July 1991. The first took place in Montreux where Miles and Quincy Jones re-created some of the classic orchestral works Miles had recorded with Gil Evans (released by Warners on video and CD under the title Live At Montreux). The other, much less publicized concert, from which “Penetration” is taken, was arguably more impressive and musically superior. The place was La Villette in Paris, the date July 10, 1991, and the performance featured many of the jazz luminaries that had played with Miles during the previous quarter century: John McLaughlin, Herbie Hancock, Joe Zawinul, Wayne Shorter, Chick Corea, Dave Holland, Al Foster, John Scofield, and many others. They were all present on Miles’s personal invitation, and deeply touched by the occasion.


See the full text here: http://www.miles-beyond.c...rdtext.htm(it's a very interesting read)

I remember reading someplace that a Prince poem/writing was read at the Miles Davis funeral. Any info on this? I also love the anecdote Prince gave in an interview of being invited over to Miles' house and being greeted at the door by a completely naked Miles Davis in person. They shared a similiar sensibility and attitude about the world and the creative process.

Novabreaker said:

Check the credits
It was common knowledge in 87
[Edited 1/25/06 11:31am]

jdcxc said:

They were very similar to one another, that is one reason they took to each other like they did. Eerily similar!

gargamelgibson said:

So there are Prince songs on a Miles Davis record? Never knew that.

Drkman said:

Yes, and everybody knows that it's Miles Davis playing on the Madhouse B-side "6 & 1/2". The only problem is that it doesn't sound like Miles at all. Actually, only somebody who is not familiar with Miles could say it is Miles on "Adore" or "6 & 1/2". It takes about one second to know it's Atlanta Bliss on both of these tunes. So, stop spreading stupid rumours, please...

calldapplwondery83 said:

Yep, check the original tracklisting to "The Last Word":

http://www.miles-beyond.c...cklist.htm

"Can I Play With U?", "Jailbait" (studio), and "Penetration" (live) are there. Too bad it was cancelled, in part because of Prince...

jdcxc said:

I remember it, too. I never understood if it was a real poem that was read or if it was the tune "Letter 4 Miles" that was played. See:

http://www.uptown.se/2005...song.shtml

"Letter 4 Miles

An instrumental tribute to Miles Davis, recorded by Prince and Michael Bland on September 30th 1991, two days after Davis' death. A horn arrangement by The Hornheadz was added later. Prince improvises on piano and synth around a fluid bassline and Bland's subtle drums. "It isn't solemn at all," comments Bland. "Prince just told me, 'We're gonna swing it.' I didn't know the title or that it had anything to do with Miles." The piece could have fit very well on the first Madhouse album. Although sometimes referred to as "Miles Is Not Dead," the correct title is "Letter 4 Miles.""

olb99 said:

Please.....I've been listening to Miles for over 30 years and have actually seen him play live.....
He doesn't have one sound but he is distiguishable

It's bunch of "johnny come latelys" here

Drkman said:

Drkman said:

Seriously. Please, stop spreading false information. Do not insist on knowing something you cannot possibly have any valid insider knowledge upon. You can always speculate and offer a possibility of something having taken place, but do not outrightly insist. It's just stupid.

This should be in the org-joining rules, btw.

Novabreaker said:

Folks like you are the reason I’m not here often. You have no knowledge of what I know
It not important enough for me to debate this
I’m out


Peace

And here I thought I[i][u] knew alot about Prince..
Man, you guys/ladies are good!...thanks for the info

Drkman said:

Well, thank you very much. I will take that as a compliment.

Release It!

For the record:

Miles DOES NOT play on "Adore", "6 1/2" or "Crucial". Nor is "Amandla" a Prince composition. Read my post above - that pretty much sums up everything Prince and Miles did (that's been confirmed anyhow).

It's true that Prince did thank a "Miles D" in the credits of Sign O The Times, but that does not mean he played on the tracks. It's Atlanta Bliss. You can tell by the vibrato and the tone. I majored in Orchestral Trumpet at University, and I also own just about every Miles and Prince album there is, so I like to think I know what I'm talking about!!

STOP THE RUMORS

I arrived in MPLS on the evening that Miles passed away and the news had hit the newswires. Prince turned up at GlaM SlaM dressed smartly, but head-to-toe in black. He watched the dancefloor for a short while but looked very forlorn - then split.

He couldn't have been there more than 10 minutes.