Miles Dewey Davis: The Legend Of Jazz Music

May 26, 1926 in Alton, Illinois, a true legend of Jazz music was born. Miles Dewey Davis III, son of Miles Dewey Davis II and Cleota Mae Davis, was the middle child in the family. Miles had an older sister, Dorothy Mae Davis and a little brother, Vernon Davis. Both of his parents worked, making enough money live a middle-class lifestyle in a household which was located in a white neighborhood. His dad was a dental surgeon and his mother worked as a music teacher and a violinist, which justifies that it was in his blood to posses musically inclined skills. At the age of 13, miles received his first trumpet and as most historic musicians do, he learned to play at a supernatural rate. He joined his high school band and began to take private lessons
with a man named Elwood Buchanan. Buchanan was a friend of his father and was the real deal when it came to teaching the trumpet. Opposing most trumpeters at the time, Elwood was a frim believer in playing with a style that lacked much use of vibrato and this is the style he made Miles learn. This meant he played more mid-range tone instead of the usual pulsating pitch change. From the beginning, Miles had already acquired a more unique tone for how he played the trumpet and this was something that stuck with him throughout his entire life, as he used it to forever benefit and further the culture and style of Jazz. While still attending high school and only a young teenager, Miles started to realize he could do something with himself from his ability to play the trumpet. He started to earn a little money from playing in local bands and bars, as well as any gig he could get himself into. While at the age of 17, Miles joined Eddie Randle's band located in St. Louis. They were called the Blue Devils and he shortly became the musical director for them. At his mother’s request he was forced to come back and finish his last year of high school. Shortly after graduating, Miles girlfriend, Irene Cawthorn gave birth to their daughter Cheryl. A few months later Miles was invited to play in the Billy Eckstine Band, whom Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie also took part in. He was fortunate enough to play with them for two weeks at a place called Club Riviera in St. Louis. He then followed his dad’s advice by attending Julliard School, in New York City, which was called “The Institute of Musical Arts” at the time. Not long after being in New York, Miles went to search for Charlie Parker and was successful in doing so. The two of the them performed at many night clubs together in Harlem. Parker took Davis under his wing as he became not only his protégée, but also roommate. Miles felt like he had a promising career ahead of him and decided to drop out of college, which was without a doubt a rewarding choice. He became a member of the Charlie Parker Quartet and the music they performed was the bebop style jazz. Davis started making his recordings in the studio, most of which were with Parker’s Band. Davis also was successful in landing a spot in Benny Carter’s Band, that was located in St. Louis. Fortunately, Carter’s and Parker’s bands both travel the West coast at similar times and he gets to perform for both. However, Charlie Parker gets hospitalized in Los Angeles for several months, this left Miles stranded on the other side of the country. Thankfully he he was offered a spot on Eckstine’s tour and they ended up bringing him back to New York later on. Shortly after returning, his son Gregory was born. Miles was not very fond of bebop Music, because he didn’t like how tense the music was nor how speedy it was played.
He wanted to generate something new, yet original; a type of Jazz that was just as unique as Miles himself, hence the origin of Cool Jazz. Miles put together a band of himself in 1949, called the Miles Davis Nonet and Gil Evans was the arranger for them. This band featured a strange addition of a tuba and a French horn. The band also included a trombone, alto saxophone, and baritone saxophone. The band signed with Capitol Records and they produced 12 tracks. The songs didn’t have that much of an affect on fans, but it did affect other musicians, especially the two singles ‘Move” and “Boplicity,” these later were added to the album Birth of the Cool. Miles went to Paris to play at the Paris International Jazz Festival with the Tadd Dameron Quintet. This was his first time out of the country and he seemed to fall in love with the place, along with a woman he had met too. Juliette Greco, an actress and singer that Davis started a serious love affair
with. Davis’ relationships weren’t the only thing going bad for him, he started to have a serious drug problem. This wasn’t uncommon, during this time period there were almost more musicians that were drug addicts and alcoholics than weren’t. Some people could take it in moderation, or at least still function throughout the day. But as for Miles Davis, he was hooked on heroin and it was not looking good for him. In 1950, Davis was charged with heroin possession in Los Angeles. He was still continuing to perform and record, and somehow managed to cash in a 3-year contract with Prestige Records. However, Davis’ addiction started to get so intense that it was heavily affecting his ability to perform and play the trumpet. He decided to something about his drug addiction, so he goes back to St. Louis and lives with his dad for a few months. He didn’t completely kill his addiction after he left, so he went back to his dad’s house and went cold turkey. He locked himself in the guest house for about a week until he went though all the painful withdraws and could finally overcome the addiction. His goal following this was to get his life back on the right track, he moved to Detroit because there were too many drugs in New York City. He only stayed there for about half a year or so until returning to New York in 1954. After coming down off his drug addiction, Davis’ personality was much more distant, as he had a quick temper and always aggravated. On top of that, he had to get surgery on his larynx because there were polyps that needed to be removed. The operation was successful other than the fact Davis wasn’t supposed to talk at all and of course he got in an argument. The yelling caused permanent damage on his vocal cords forever, giving him a now raspy voice. Davis brought back his band, but a new one of course. This band consisted of drummer Philly Joe Jones, bassist Paul Chambers, pianist Red Garland and saxophonist John Coltrane. They were referred to often as “the first great quintet.” The band landed a contract with Colombia Records are their great performance at Newport Jazz Festival. The Quintet also released a very popular record called ‘Round About Midnight. The band broke up in 1957 for numerous reasons, none for certain, but Davis blamed it on drug addictions with Coltrane and Jones. Davis then made a come back with his new group, Chambers and Coltrane were still on board. Alto saxophonist Cannonball Adderley, drummer Jimmy Cobb, and pianist Wynton Kelley were three new additions to the band. They were now considered the sextet and they didn’t waist any time making music. They produced the famous album Kind of Blue, this album sold over 2 million copies. Not only was this Davis’ best selling record, but its also the best selling jazz record of all time. August 1959, Davis gets into a confrontation with a police officer outside of the night club he worked at. The situation got heated, followed by three cops physically harming him. He was charged with disorderly conduct and third-degree assault. Davis tried to fight the case but the court was suspending his license to play music as long as he was trying to fight it. So he just had to give it up in order to get his license back.
The emerge of a new quintet came about in 1965, staring bassist Ron Carter, pianist Herbie Hancock, drummer Tony Williams, and saxophonist Wayne Shorter. This band was known as “the second great quintet.” This quintet had tremendous impact on on jazz during the 60’s. the released several albums during the years they were together such as: Miles Smiles, Nefertiti, Miles in the Sky, and Filles de Kilimanjaro. Some of the songs in these albums introduce the electric guitar, electric bass and electric piano. Davis not only influenced Jazz musicians, but rock musicians as well. He influenced James Brown, Jimi Hendrix, Sly and the Family Stone and Parliament-Funkadelic, he also accumulated a large number of rock star fans. Davis new style was a mixture of jazz and roll. He became the first Jazz musician to appear on the cover of Rolling Stones magazine.
Although Davis seemed to be on top of the world, his health surely was not.
Not only did he pick back up his habits of drugs and alcohol dependency, but he also had osteoarthritis, sickle-cell anemia, depression, bursitis, and ulcers. Considering the state his health was in and it was only getting worse, he backed out of the music completely. This lasted for six years, he rarely played any trumpet but did do a fair amount of composing during this time. Not until 1979 did he overcome his cocaine addiction and find his sparking love for music again, with the help of his girlfriend Cicely Tyson. He got back into business, releasing his album The Man with the Horn. The album sold decently, yet for some reason the critics gave it poor reviews. Then a few years later he released the albums Tutu and Aura. He started getting into studio-created projects, signing a contract with Warner Brothers, he was making music for shows and movies. Davis also did a little bit of acting too in his elder days. His last two albums were Quincy Jones and Miles and Quincy Live at
Montreux.
Davis died from a stroke, respiratory failure, and pneumonia on September 28th, 1991. He was 65 years old and place of death was Santa Monica, California. He was buried in cemetery in Bronx, New York City. Clearly Miles Davis had his great deal of problems, especially those related to drugs or relationships with women, however that’s not the legacy he left behind. He is known for his amazing talents that he had, one of the greatest trumpeters, if not the best trumpeter to ever life. Not to mention how great of a band leader and composer he was. Davis played with every great Jazz musician that lived in his time period, on top of that he made countless people famous due to his precise selection in musicians he selected. Miles released 48 studio albums and 36 live albums in his life time, which awarded him with 9 Grammies. Miles Davis was definitely a unique artist and brought about so much change in the course of Jazz music, concluding his music to have bettered the life of so many musicians of time, as well as the music culture in general.