Without being a real expert about him or Jazz in general, I have heard or own quite a lot of his albums and styles. While I love for example "Kind of Blue" the period that really grabed me is his "electric" period. Bitches Brew, A Tribute to Jack Johnson, On the Corner (this has to be the most radical noise ever!), Agharta/Pangaea....All this stuff is so great, he really seemed to know no limits, especially on 'On the Corner'.

What is your fave era? Any stories from you experts on here about him or his significanse for music? I'd say together with Jimi Hendrix, Sly Stone, James Brown, Stevie Wonder, The Beatles, some early Blues musician and maybe Prince and Bowie, he surely must be the most important musician of the 20th century. For me at least.



And R.I.P., Mr Davis. Shoulda been around a little longer.

It is difficult to choose a specific 'era'. I have found most Miles Davis fans love and appreciate all of his work, just like one would Picasso during his Blue and Rose periods.

My favorite works are Kind of Blue and Bitches Brew, but I cannot give you any specific time during his career that I enjoyed his music any more or any less - I am just an avid fan - period.

He is culturally iconic, and mercurial and even after his death, his music and fame have defied limits beyond any expectations.

I forgot to mention, tA is quite the aficionado, so I pass to him for further information.

cubic61052 said:

That's propably true today, but I can really see a lot of people being put off back then by the fusion thing, and again, especially 'On the Corner' because it's so street, so Sly. I think part of his genius was to truely be ahead of even his fans, and therefore experiencing some backlash now and then.

cubic61052 said:

Yes, I hope he has something to post here.

...

I love it all, but my personal favorites are his jazz orchestral and nonet work with Gil Evans , like Miles Ahead, Birth Of The Cool, Sketches of Spain, Porgy and Bess, and also his electric period , circa "Jack Johnson, On The Corner", etc....







...
[Edited 8/18/06 14:12pm]

Jack Johnson is so amazing, I wish I had the bucks for those box sets.

calldapplwondery83 said:

Bitches Brew. I like all his eras, but for some reason I keep coming back to the Bitches Brew album, and the few live recordings released around 69-71 more than any other.
[Edited 8/18/06 14:12pm]

easily 1958 - 1963

calldapplwondery83 said:

As an artist he was most definitely ahead of his time had to go through some rough periods before the general public finally got it....On the Corner is off the hook and a certain diversion from his other stuff....

From 55-63, I guess:

'Round About Midnight (1955)

Milestones (1958)

Workin' With The Miles Davis Quintet (1956)

Miles Ahead (1957)

Porgy and Bess (1958)

Kind of Blue (1959)

Quiet Nights (1963)

To me, they're all important, all essential and all favorites.
We're talking about someone who maintained an artistic relevancy through 5 decades!
That's some seriously rareified air.

Putting the music aside for a moment, from a purely political perspective, i'd vote for the "electric period" just because of the nose-thumbing it gave the Jazz intelligentsia.
Refusing to be boxed into the old ways and old sounds, having the vision to incorporate elements from other musical genres, extended and expanded his career like none of his musical comtemporaries.

Another "humiliating kick in the crotch" he doled out was to Columbia Records
(who had pretty much anointed his label mate, Wynton Marsalis, as the new King of Jazz).
When he sensed they were back-burnering him for Wynton, he jumped ship for Warner Bros.
With his first release of Tutu, he promptly had a #1 Jazz Album and copped a Grammy for the Best Jazz Instrumental Performance by a soloist (1986).

Wynton's '86 release on Columbia (JMood) did relatively well also.
But which album do you think is more recognized or owned by more folks? Tutu or JMood?

I've got nothing against Wynton Marsalis.
I think he's an exceptionally talented player and via the Jazz program he co-founded at Lincoln Center, is bringing this music to young people.
But musically, he is a traditionalist. And we do need those.

We also need folks who are musically skillfull, visionary and innovative to upset the apple cart and push the form forward.
That was Miles Davis. And we definitely need those.

So short answer (might be too late for that), i'm picking the electric period but for more than just the music.


"I never thought that the music called “jazz” was ever meant to reach just a small group of people, or become a museum thing locked under glass like all the other dead things that were once considered artistic."

~Miles Davis


tA

Tribal Disorder

http://www.soundclick.com...dID=182431

calldapplwondery83 said:

I love Miles Davis. Every note he played is worth listening to, as is every record he ever cut. No one made a trumpet sound the same way. Wish his keyboard playing on "Riot" would get released, ditto his collaborations with Prince.

medoc2003 said:

Yeah.....good era.

I honestly love everything I've heard, but I'm most drawn to what was happening around '69/'70.

It's definitely the Second Great Quintet era with Shorter, Hanock, Carter & Williams

theAudience said:

Excellent post, sums up my sentiments exactly!

theAudience said:

Scrapluv said:

I have the box set that corresponds to that era, and it's fucking KILLER!

What about John Coltraine?

I have A Love Supreme and I love it as much as Miles' stuff.

Talking of Miles, there was a documentary on BBC4 in the UK called "Saving Jazz" and it was about Herman Leonard who was a Jazz photographer, who took a lot of pictures of all the Jazz greats like Miles Davis back in 40s and 50s.

He lived in New Orleans during the Katrina floods, and although the floods destroyed his house and many of his possessions, including his collection of Jazz pictures, the floods for someone reason or another didn't destroy the whole the whole pictures. The faces of Miles Davis, Billie Holiday, Ella and Dizzy were left intact, whilst the areas of the pictures around their faces were destroyed by the floods.

The accompany music to the documentary was brilliant too, you heard Miles, Ella, Billie Holiday, Charlie Park, Dizzy and the list went on.

I am not a great fan of Jazz, although I do have a "Kind of Blue" but has I have got older I am beginning to appreciate more and more the Jazz greats like Charlie Parker, Dizzy, Louis and Miles. I think they are the true innovators of music.

Miles Smiles, Bitches Brew, Sketches of Spain, On the Corner, Kind of Blue. Bags Groove. On the Corner.

Give a non jazz head these records (all quite different) and watch them flip out. Life changing music indeed.

theAudience said:

Ndeed!! It kinda reminds me of that debate that Herbie Hancock and Wynton Marsalis had in Musician Magazine, in the mid-eighties...Wynton finally asked Herbie if, as an artist, making his "Electric" records was as fulfilling as playing "Jazz" --- and Herbie replied, "Really, I only feel truly fulfilled when I'm doing both."





...

The electric period grabbed me first, and I really dig On The Corner & Jack Johnson, but I think the richest & most lasting record I've heard of Miles may be Miles Ahead

Coming in close second might be the transitional period, early electric & late acoustc--Filles de kilimonjaro, Nefertiti, In a Silent Way.

Of course, it's hard to argue with the more traditional combo stuff, like Kind Of Blue or Round About Midnight (definitely one of the coolest album covers ever)

paligap said:

That's a great answer Mr. Hancock gave him.

And in reality Miles did "both" also. He just did them sequentially.
Wynton's got that Stanley Grouch mentality.
Anything other than traditionally Jazz is somehow beneath them.

To each his own.

tA

Tribal Disorder

http://www.soundclick.com...dID=182431

theAudience said:

Seems like Wynton wants to play "jazz" while Miles & others of his mindset just wanted to play music.

medoc2003 said:

i answer, 1958-1963 is as follows.
first, my reading of the question is. what is tor favorite miles davis era? not what is the most popular, controversial, musically important, socio-politically important era, just your favorite era.

i chose '58-63 because:

milestones
live at newport 1958
'59 sessions featuring stella by starlight (the jazz at the plaza and jazz track side 2 lp)
kind of blue
porgy and bess
sketches of spain
some day my prince will come
lise at carnegie hall w/ quintet and gil evans orchestra
in concert friday night (live at the blackhawk)
in concert saturday night (live at the blackhawk)
seven steps to heaven
quiet nights (the weakest of the bunch)
in europe (live at the antibes jazz festival)

were all releaed/recorded during this period. only quiet nights isn't a totally great album.
added to this, is that i have a lot of live discs from 1958-1963, among this are that i have several discs from the miles/coltarne 1960 tour and the miles 1963 tour, both of which heavily influence my choice. if i didn't have some of the live stuff from 1963, i'd back it up 2 years to 1956-1961, which would capture miles ahead round about midnight and all the great prestige quintet stuff.

NDRU said:

...



Yup! I like Wynton's stuff, but it's funny, with all this "pure jazz" stuff, you'd think he was the oldest Marsalis brother, and not Branford....

...no, no... I guess now that I think about it, Branford does come off as older, at least in terms of musical perspective...like Miles and Herbie, he wants to play "all of it"...




....

paligap said:

Bingo. You both nailed it.


tA

Tribal Disorder

http://www.soundclick.com...dID=182431