Jazz Articles about Miles Davis

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Miles Davis: The Cool Jazz Sound

by John Kelman
April 17, 2005

Miles Davis The Cool Jazz Sound Disconforme 2869033 Recorded 1959; released on DVD 2004

Any chance to see archival footage of Miles Davis in performance is a treat, mainly because, for a career that spanned six decades, so little of it seems available. And so EFORFilms, responsible for releasing the Jazz Casual series on DVD, has a sure winner with Miles Davis: The Cool Jazz Sound. Originally broadcast in 1959, this 25-minute television performance ...

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Miles Electric: A Different Kind of Blue

by Rex Butters
April 3, 2005

Miles Davis Electric Miles: A Different Kind of Blue Eagle Eye Media 2004

The 1970 Isle of Wight festival nearly doubled the attendance numbers of Woodstock, and boasted a similarly stellar lineup. Besides Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix, and Joni Mitchell, Miles Davis brought a daring young group of explorers and strode out onstage to 600,000 listeners with one of his early electric ensembles. Concocting a roiling sonic stew, Miles led the band through a ...

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Miles Davis: In Person Friday and Saturday Nights at the Blackhawk Complete

by Samuel Chell
April 3, 2005

Possession of previous editions of this singular set simply won't do. After the Ellington at Newport and The Complete Lady Day reissues, the engineers at Columbia/Sony command respect as experts when it comes to authoritative, definitive, faithfully represented remasters of indispensable jazz recordings.

This “transitional" group, between Miles' first great quintet with Coltrane and his second with Wayne Shorter, is the equal of the first ensemble and more satisfying than the second. Miles' chops were never better, and as if ...

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Miles Davis: Round About Lunchtime: The Complete Columbia Cafeteria Recordings 1955-85

by Joshua Weiner
April 1, 2005

In its extensive series of boxed sets detailing the genesis of some of Miles Davis' greatest recordings, Columbia/Legacy has produced one of the most impressive bodies of jazz reissues extant. Their latest Miles box, however, suggests that the curators of Columbia's vaults have started to go a bit overboard.

Round About Lunchtime: The Complete Miles Davis Cafeteria Recordings 1955-1985 collects the highlights (if, indeed, they can be referred to as such) from a massive stash of cassettes surreptitiously recorded on ...

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Miles Davis: Kind of Blue

by Jim Santella
March 12, 2005

Columbia's latest release of this essential album includes the original liner notes by Bill Evans, a new liner note essay by Robert Palmer, a bonus track alternate take of “Flamenco Sketches," a 25-minute documentary DVD on Kind of Blue, and the original music itself. It sounds as good today as it did 46 years ago. In the words of television journalist and jazz devotee Ed Bradley, “It's as strong today as it was for me in ...

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Miles Davis v. Wynton Marsalis: Jack Johnson in Jazz

by Michael Holman
March 8, 2005

A director fascinated by the outsized life of the African-American boxer Jack Johnson sets out to make a documentary to tell the man's story. Given the centrality of race to Johnson's story and Johnson's own musical interests, a jazz soundtrack seems most appropriate, so he enlists the foremost jazz trumpeter of the day to provide a score. This certainly will sound familiar to those who've caught Ken Burns' latest PBS documentary, Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall ...

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Miles Davis: My Funny Valentine

by Jim Santella
February 17, 2005

Many have tried to copy Miles Davis, but no one can measure up to the kind of performances that he gave us when he was in his prime and led the mainstream. This concert from February 12, 1964 at Lincoln Center's Philharmonic Hall in New York ranks among the best. With George Coleman, Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter and Tony Williams, he expressed the deep affection that we all feel in our hearts when romance is the subject.

Davis ...