BIOGRAPHICAL DETAILS
Full Name: Miles Dewey Davis
Description: Trumpeter
Known For: Sessions in 1962 resulted in the album “Quiet Nights”
Instruments: Trumpet
Music Styles: Jazz
Location: United States of America
Date Born: 25th May 1926
Location Born: Alton, Illinois, United States of America
Date Died: 28th September 1991
Location Died: Santa Monica, California, United States of America
Cause Of Death: Pneumonia
Memorial: He is buried in Woodlawn Cemetery in The Bronx, New York.
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BIOGRAPHICAL PROFILE
Miles Davis
Miles Dewey Davis III (May 26, 1926 – September 28, 1991) was an American jazz musician, trumpeter, bandleader, and composer. Widely considered one of the most influential and innovative musicians of the 20th century, Miles Davis was, together with his musical groups, at the forefront of several major developments in jazz music, including bebop, cool jazz, hard bop, modal jazz, post-bop and jazz fusion.
In 2006, Davis was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, which recognized him as “one of the key figures in the history of jazz”. In 2008, his 1959 album Kind of Blue received its fourth platinum certification from the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), for shipments of at least four million copies in the United States. On December 15, 2009, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a symbolic resolution recognizing and commemorating the album Kind of Blue on its 50th anniversary, “honoring the masterpiece and reaffirming jazz as a national treasure”
Miles Dewey Davis III was born on May 26, 1926, to an affluent African American family in Alton, Illinois. His father, Miles Dewey Davis, Jr., was a dentist. In 1927 the family moved to East St. Louis, Illinois. They also owned a substantial ranch in the Delta region of Arkansas near the city of Pine Bluff, where Davis’s father and grandfather were from. It was in both East St. Louis and near Pine Bluff that young Davis developed his earliest appreciation for music listening to the gospel music of the black church.
Above: Miles Davis Youth House on 17th st. and Kansas Av., East St. Louis, IL in oct. 2014
Davis’ mother, Cleota Mae Davis (née Henry), wanted her son to learn the piano; she was a capable blues pianist but did not tell Miles. His musical studies began at 13, when his father gave him a trumpet and arranged lessons with local musician Elwood Buchanan. Davis later suggested that his father’s instrument choice was made largely to irk his wife, who disliked the trumpet’s sound. Against the fashion of the time, Buchanan stressed the importance of playing without vibrato; he was reported to have slapped Davis’ knuckles every time he started using heavy vibrato. Davis would carry his clear signature tone throughout his career. He once remarked on its importance to him, saying, “I prefer a round sound with no attitude in it, like a round voice with not too much tremolo and not too much bass. Just right in the middle. If I can’t get that sound I can’t play anything. Clark Terry was another important early influence.
By age 16, Davis was a member of the music society and, when not at school, playing professionally first at the local Elks Club. At 17, he spent a year playing in Eddie Randle’s band, the Blue Devils. During this time, Sonny Stitt tried to persuade him to join the Tiny Bradshaw band, then passing through town, but Davis’ mother insisted that he finish his final year of high school. He graduated from East St. Louis Lincoln High School in 1944.
In 1944, the Billy Eckstine band visited East St. Louis. Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker were members of the band; they invited Davis to play third trumpet for a couple of weeks because their regular member, Buddy Anderson, was ill. Even after this experience, once Eckstine’s band left town, Davis’ parents were still keen for him to continue formal academic studies.
In the fall of 1944, following graduation from high school, Davis moved to New York City to study at the Juilliard School of Music. Upon arriving in New York City, he spent most of his first weeks in town trying to get in contact with Charlie Parker, despite being advised against doing so by several people he met during his quest, including saxophonist Coleman Hawkins.
Later years and death
By 1979, Davis had rekindled his relationship with actress Cicely Tyson, with whom he overcame his cocaine addiction and regained his enthusiasm for music. As he had not played trumpet for the better part of three years, regaining his famed embouchure proved particularly toilsome. While recording The Man with the Horn at a leisurely pace throughout 1980–1981, Davis played mostly wahwah with a younger, larger band.
The initial large band was eventually abandoned in favor of a smaller combo featuring saxophonist Bill Evans (not to be confused with pianist Bill Evans of the 1958–59 sextet), and bass player Marcus Miller, both of whom would be among Davis’s most regular collaborators throughout the decade. He married Tyson in 1981; they would divorce in 1988. The Man with the Horn was finally released in 1981 and received a poor critical reception despite selling fairly well. In May, the new band played two dates as part of the Newport Jazz Festival. The concerts, as well as the live recording We Want Miles from the ensuing tour, received positive reviews.
By late 1982, Davis’s band included French percussionist Mino Cinelu and guitarist John Scofield, with whom he worked closely on the album Star People. In mid-1983, while working on the tracks for Decoy, an album mixing soul music and electronica that was released in 1984, Davis brought in producer, composer and keyboardist Robert Irving III, who had earlier collaborated with him on The Man with the Horn. With a seven-piece band, including Scofield, Evans, keyboardist and music director Irving, drummer Al Foster and bassist Darryl Jones (later of the Rolling Stones), Davis played a series of European gigs to positive receptions. While in Europe, he took part in the recording of Aura, an orchestral tribute to Davis composed by Danish trumpeter Palle Mikkelborg.
You’re Under Arrest, Davis’ next album, was released in 1985 and included another brief stylistic detour. Included on the album were his interpretations of Cyndi Lauper’s ballad “Time After Time”, and Michael Jackson’s pop hit “Human Nature”. Davis considered releasing an entire album of pop songs and recorded dozens of them, but the idea was scrapped. Davis noted that many of today’s accepted jazz standards were in fact pop songs from Broadway theater, and that he was simply updating the “standards” repertoire with new material. 1985 also saw Davis guest-star on the TV show Miami Vice as pimp and minor criminal Ivory Jones in the episode titled “Junk Love” (first aired November 8, 1985).
You’re Under Arrest was Davis’ final album for Columbia. Trumpeter Wynton Marsalis publicly dismissed Davis’ more recent fusion recordings as not being “‘true’ jazz,” comments Davis initially shrugged off, calling Marsalis “a nice young man, only confused.” This changed after Marsalis appeared, unannounced, onstage in the midst of Davis’ performance at the inaugural Vancouver International Jazz Festival in 1986. Marsalis whispered into Davis’ ear that “someone” had told him to do so. Davis responded by ordering him off the stage.
MILES DAVIS – trumpet
JACKIE McLEAN – alto sax
SONNY ROLLINS – ten sax
WALTER BISHOP Jr – piano
TOMMY POTTER – bass
ART BLAKEY – drums
STAN GETZ – CHUBBY JACKSON – LEE KONITZ – BILLY BAUER
MILES DAVIS QUARTET – 1955
MILES DAVIS – trumpet
RED GARLAND – piano
OSCAR PETTIFORD – bass
PHILLY JOE JONES – drums
MILES DAVIS QUINTET – 1956
MILES DAVIS – trumpet
JOHN COLTRANE – ten sax
RED GARLAND – piano
PAUL CHAMBERS – bass
PHILLY JOE JONES – drums
RUBY BRAFF – 1956
DAVE BRUBECK
RAY BRYANT
CONTE CANDOLI
AL COHN
GENE QUILL
JJ JOHNSON
HANK JONES
HORACE SILVER
SELDON POWELL
MILES DAVIS ALL STARS – 1947
MILES DAVIS – trumpet
CHARLIE PARKER – alto sax
JOHN LEWIS – piano
NELSON BOYD – bass
MAX ROACH – drums
MILES DAVIS SEXTET – 1951
MILES DAVIS – trumpet
BENNY GREEN – trombone
JOHN LEWIS – piano
SONNY ROLLINS – ten sax
PERCY HEATH – bass
ROY HAYNES – drums
DIZZY GILLESPIE
KENNY DOORMAN
FATS NAVARRO
MILES DAVIS ORCHESTRA (Direction – Gil Evens) 1957
MILES DAVIS – fl-horn
JOHN CARISE – BERNIE GLOW – TAFT JORDAN – LOUIS MUCCI
ERNIE ROYAL – trumpet.
JOE BENNETT – JIMMY CLEVELAND – FRANK REHAK – trombone
TOM MITCHELL – bass, trombone
BILL BARBER – tuba
LEE KONITZ – alto sax
SID COOPER – EDWIN CAINE – ROMEO PENQUE – clarinet
DANNY BANK – bass, clarinet
PAUL CHAMBERS – bass
ART TAYLOR – drums
All of the above musicians worked with Miles Davis between
1947 and 1957 and recorded in New York and New Jersey.