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Type of Submission
Podium Presentation
Keywords
Miles Davis, Jazz, Harmon mute, modal jazz, Birth of the Cool, avant-garde, jazz-rock fusion, Walkin’, hard bop, cool jazz.
Proposal
This paper will explore the numerous ways Miles Davis was able to reinvent Jazz six times. Through studying scores, biographies, solo transcriptions, and interviews it will become evident what he changed in Jazz and how he accomplished these changes. These will be worked through chronologically. There are six primary reinventions we will study: how his nonet helped launch cool jazz, the impetus his “Walkin’” session provided for hard bop, the new mood his three major recording sessions with Gil Evans produced in all aspect of Jazz, the birth of modal jazz with the album “Kind of Blue,” his exploration of avant-garde with his second quintet, and how he initiated the jazz-rock fusion era with “Bitches Brew.” In many of these I expect it will be evident that Miles Davis was able to innovate due to his thirst for improvement and his willingness to have the humility to learn from young up-and-coming musicians.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
New Directions: A Study of How Miles Davis was Able to Continually Reinvent Jazz
This paper will explore the numerous ways Miles Davis was able to reinvent Jazz six times. Through studying scores, biographies, solo transcriptions, and interviews it will become evident what he changed in Jazz and how he accomplished these changes. These will be worked through chronologically. There are six primary reinventions we will study: how his nonet helped launch cool jazz, the impetus his “Walkin’” session provided for hard bop, the new mood his three major recording sessions with Gil Evans produced in all aspect of Jazz, the birth of modal jazz with the album “Kind of Blue,” his exploration of avant-garde with his second quintet, and how he initiated the jazz-rock fusion era with “Bitches Brew.” In many of these I expect it will be evident that Miles Davis was able to innovate due to his thirst for improvement and his willingness to have the humility to learn from young up-and-coming musicians.
