FEATURE:
Beneath the Sleeve
Miles Davis – Kind of Blue
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I don’t often cover…
IN THIS PHOTO: Miles Davis in 1959/PHOTO CREDIT: Everett Collection/Abaca
classic Jazz albums in my blog. However, for this feature, I was compelled to discuss in more detail one of the all-time best albums. Released on 17th August, 1959 and produced by Irving Townsend, this masterpiece was captured at Columbia 30th Street Studio, New York City. Even though it was a bigger success in the U.S. than it was in the U.K., this hugely influential album has reached listeners around the world. I am going to come to some features around Kind of Blue in a minute. Before that, I wanted to highlight some information from Wikipedia. In terms of its legacy and impact, few albums of the twentieth century are as important as Kind of Blue:
“Kind of Blue has been lauded as one of the most influential albums in the history of jazz. One reviewer has called it a "defining moment of twentieth century music". Several of the pieces from the album have become jazz standards. Kind of Blue is consistently ranked among the greatest albums of all time. In a review of the album, AllMusic senior editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine stated:
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 possess 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”.
There are some interesting retrospectives like this. Prior to getting to some reviews of a landmark album, this feature from 2022 talks about the making of Kind of Blue. I am not especially knowledgeable regarding the history of the album and its background. When researching for this feature, it was interesting reading about the players and details about the songs. It must have been such a powerful and memorable experience being at Columbia 30th Street Studio during March and April 1959:
“It was the spring of the year 1959, often considered as the greatest year of Jazz that one of the greatest Jazz musicians of all time, Miles Davis gathered a set of brilliant jazz musicians into the famous Columbia’s 30th street studio also known as “The Church”, an old reconstructed Greek Church in Manhattan, NY.
We take a look at what went behind the making of arguably the greatest Jazz album of all time – Kind of Blue, thereby also touching briefly on how Miles and Kind of Blue influenced Indian musicians leading to the release of “Miles From India” in 2008, almost after five decades since it was first released in 1959.
Miles From India is an album that features songs associated with Miles Davis but performed in new arrangements by American jazz musicians and performers from India.
Coming back to Kind of Blue, despite being quite unique, this album is ubiquitous among music lovers. Lovers & friends continue to give the album to each other even after 63 years of its release!
For many music lovers Kind of Blue is the only jazz album they possess. The ultimate album that one is most likely to have heard at a retail store, Starbucks, or at a friend’s place who claims to be a Jazz expert.
Yet, despite all those playing over the years, the record manages to still hold on and still sounds fantastic and inspirational, justifying all the attention it gets.
➡ Recording Sessions and Personnel:
There were two recording sessions, the first one commenced on March, 2nd and the second session was recorded on April, 22nd in 1959. ”43079” was the project number that Columbia had assigned the yet unnamed Kind of Blue session.
There was no written music given to the musicians by Miles and he had brought only sketches of what everybody was supposed to play as he wanted a lot of spontaneity in the playing.
As Bill Evans, who wrote the liner notes of the album puts it, “Miles conceived the setting only hours before recording dates arrived with sketches which indicated the group, what was to be played”
Kind of Blue was recorded with seven now-legendary musicians in the prime of their careers: tenor saxophonist John Coltrane, alto saxophonist Julian "Cannonball" Adderley, pianists Bill Evans and Wynton Kelly, bassist Paul Chambers, drummer Jimmy Cobb apart from the leader of the session himself, trumpeter Miles Davis.
Wynton played only on Freddie Freeloader in the original album. An interesting anecdote mentioned in Ashley Kahn’s A Kind of Blue book recalls how Wynton was surprised to see Bill Evans at the studio and almost left before Miles explained to him that he wanted Wynton also in the first recording session.
➡ The tracks of Kind of Blue
1. So What:
The album opener “So What” is one of the most famous compositions in jazz and is as energetic as the Kind of Blue album can get. Davis and Gil Evans were influenced by composer and pianist George Russell, author of The Lydian Chromatic Concept of Tonal Organization, a radical book of “modal” jazz theory.
The Piano chord played at the start by Bill Evans, another student of Russell is strongly reminiscent of the opening of Debussy’s “Voiles”, composed in 1909.
The melody and use of chords are also reportedly inspired by a tune called Pavanne by Ahmad Jamal who was one of the favorite Piano players of Miles Davis.
So What also inspired the personal theme of the fellow jazz legend and sideman for this session, John Coltrane. Coltrane recorded his tune “Impressions” a number of times in his career which he used to refer to as “So What” before settling the name as Impressions in 1962.
So what continues to be a Guitar player’s favorite, notably covered by Grant Green in 1961 and George Benson in 1971. Jerry Garcia along with David Grisman covered this for their 1998 acoustic jazz album of the same name.
[Watch the video of ‘So What” which was first aired, as part of the program titled “The Sound of Miles Davis” on July 21st, 1961 after being recorded in 1959]
2. Freddie Freeloader:
Freddie Freeloader is inspired by a colorful street character named Fred Tolbert who was friends with Miles in the heyday of the sextet. One of Tolbert’s business cards read simply “Freddie Freeloader” acknowledging his lifestyle.
Bill Evans wrote on the liner notes, that this is a 12-measure Blues form given new personality by effective melodic and rhythmic simplicity.
3. Blue In Green:
Despite Miles calling out that this was solely his composition, to this day this composition is credited to “Davis-Evans” on various albums by Evans.
As per Bill Evans, "Blue in Green" is a ten-measure cycle following a short four-measure introduction and played by a soloist in various augmentation and diminution of time values
Blue in Green is often considered the only composition from the album bordering on absolute minimalism in its expression and construction.
4. Flamenco Sketches:
A tune again claimed to have been composed jointly by Evans, This remains the most modal composition on Kind Of Blue. As Ashley Khan writes in his book, Kind Of Blue, this is also the most prismatic tune on the album, refracting a variety of influences (classical, impressionistic, exotic) into a haunting, pan-cultural theme covering a wide emotional range.
5. All Blues:
It was the last of the five tracks recorded which Miles once described as a slowed down version of his earlier composition “Milestones”. The interplay between Davis and Bill Evans is one of the highlights of the album.
The playing of Evans mimics a kind of strumming the instrument which probably was one of the qualities that attracted the legendary Guitarist Duane Allman, whose version of this tune titled “In Memory of Elizabeth Reed” became one of the big hits for the Allman Brothers Band.
➡ Flaws at the Time of Release:
Despite all the admiration the album garnered over the years, it also came with certain flaws. The Columbia designated A&R man and producer of this album, Irving Townsend failed to make an impactful distribution of the records to Disc Jockeys, Magazine reviewers and stores in a form that would command attention.
The cover close up of Davis taken by Jay Maisel from a show at Apollo Theater, a few months earlier was hardly inspired though the photograph of Miles taken by another photographer and featured on the back cover, relaxing on a stool during the recording session proved iconic”.
I am going to finish off with some reviews. I will start with one from the BBC. Obviously, it is near-impossible to find anything other than praise for Kind of Blue. However, it is how individual critics assess and dissect the album that is particularly interesting. I first heard the album when I was a teenager I think. Maybe not grasping its complexities and layers the first time around, I have come to fully appreciate and connect with Kind of Blue in years since:
“Long held as the jazz album that even non-jazz fans will own, Kind Of Blue not only changed the way people regarded Miles, it changed the very face of music itself. Consistently rated not just as one of the greatest jazz albums but as one of THE greatest musical statements of the 20th century, its 46 minutes of improvisation and sophistication remain peerless.
In the early 50s George Russell had raised the possibility of using a modal approach (i.e. playing within a certain scale, as opposed to according to a fixed chord sequence) as a way out of the straightjacket that restricted improvisation. Miles, at this time, was in thrall to hard bop, but by 1958's Milestones he was ready to try the modal approach, the title track being his first recorded foray into the form.
Kind Of Blue, released the following year, took the idea and developed it to an astounding degree. Its smoky evocation of late night ambience is a byword for laid back elegance. It uses the blues but transmutes those seventh chords into something that still sounds modern 50 years on. Quite simply, the sonic space it creates sounds like the coolest place on the planet.
Key to the album's deceptive ease is the band that Miles had assembled. Honed to perfection were the sextet of saxophonists John Coltrane and Cannonball Adderley, drummer Jimmy Cobb, bassist Paul Chambers and pianist Bill Evans (replacing regular Wynton Kelly on all but one track – "Freddy Freeloader"). All players were to have legendary careers, but it was Coltrane who took Miles' modal template and went furthest with it, with spectacular results.
Dispute still rages as to the role Evans had in the compositions (many regard him as at least a co-author, and he was an acolyte of George Russell's) but what we do know is that on the two recording dates that spawned this masterpiece, Davis, as usual, just laid out the song structures for the musicians on the day with no rehearsal (though "So What" and "All Blues" had been played live prior to this). From the opening murmur of the piano on "So What" to the final sad mute on "Flamenco Sketches", it never falters, despite its meandering pace. Even more miraculous, it never wears thin from repeat plays. Quincy Jones claims to play it every day. So should you”.
I am going to end with a review from AllMusic. In future editions of this feature, I will look at other genres and time periods. It is rare that I approach any albums from the 1950s. I love all of Mile Davis’s work. Each album provokes different moods and reactions. Kind of Blue has this romance and cool. It has a sadness, though I somehow feel warmer and nourished by it:
“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. To be reductive, it's the Citizen Kane of jazz -- an accepted work of greatness that's innovative and entertaining. That may not mean it's the greatest jazz album ever made, but it certainly is a universally acknowledged standard of excellence. Why does Kind of Blue posses such a mystique? Perhaps it's that this music never flaunts its genius. It lures listeners in with the slow, luxurious bassline and gentle piano chords of "So What." From that moment on, the record never really changes pace -- each tune has a similar relaxed feel, as the music flows easily. Yet Kind of Blue is more than easy listening. It's the pinnacle of modal jazz -- tonality and solos build from chords, not the overall key, giving the music a subtly shifting quality. All of this doesn't quite explain why seasoned jazz fans return to this record even after they've memorized every nuance. They return because this is an exceptional band - Miles, Coltrane, Bill Evans, Cannonball Adderly, Paul Chambers, Jimmy Cobb, and Wynton Kelly -- one of the greatest in history, playing at the peak of its power. As Evans said in the original liner notes for the record, the band did not play through any of these pieces prior to recording. Davis laid out the themes and chords before the tape rolled, and then the band improvised. The end results were wondrous, filled with performances that still crackle with vitality. Few albums of any genre manage to work on so many different levels, but Kind of Blue does. It can be played as background music, yet it amply rewards close listening. It is advanced music that is extraordinarily enjoyable. 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”.
Following Joni Mitchell’s Hejira into Beneath the Sleeve, this Jazz classic endures and inspires over sixty-five years since it was released. I can only imagine how fans reacted to Kind of Blue when it was released in 1959. Putting the album on the record player and experiencing this album that sounded like nothing else! Some people see Jazz as a joke. That maybe modern Jazz is more interesting and important. I would urge those people to listen to Kind of Blue by Miles Davis. It is a sonic experience that changes the senses. A steal on vinyl, you really must add this to your record collection! This spellbinding album will reach and move people…
FOR the rest of time.