Miles Davis once said that music was "a curse" for him because he thought of nothing else while he was awake. Music was his life. But it wasn't always the passion of his life. At first, Miles wanted to be a baseball player and then a doctor, like his father, who was a dentist. But after his father gave him his first trumpet, at the age of 11, all young Miles wanted to do was learn to play the golden horn better. He practiced for hours every day and when he entered Lincoln High School, in East St. Louis, Illinois, where he grew up, he became the trumpet star of the band. East St. Louis is on the Mississippi River, across from St. Louis, Missouri and riverboats use to travel from New Orleans, up to St. Louis carrying people like trains and airplanes do today. These riverboats employed great jazz musicians to play for their passengers, and when the boats docked in St. Louis, Miles, after he became a musician would travel across the river to hear and meet many of them.
After graduating from high school, in 1944, Miles met Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie in St. Louis and decided he wanted to become a jazz musician and live in New York City. At the age of 18, Miles moved to "The Big Apple" to study at the Juilliard School of Music, one of the best music schools in the world. But at night, Miles ran the streets, playing music with the greats of bebop like Charlie Parker, Max Roach and Thelonious Monk. During the day, Miles studied classical music at Juilliard and played jazz at night. This created a tension in young Miles between learning European notated, classical music and playing the more improvisational approaches of African-American jazz. His answer was to combine the two, not favoring one over the other. When Miles Davis recorded and released "Birth of the Cool", in 1950, it made him a leader and a "star" in the music world. Because of his "cool" attitude and the beautiful, sharp, up-to-date clothes that he wore, Miles also became a leader of both style and music. People copied the way he acted and dressed, while musicians tried to play with his air of "cool" detachment. As he became more successful, Miles bought and drove sleek, fast sports cars like Lamborghini's and Ferrari's.
In later years, Miles played his trumpet with his back to the audience. This confused and angered some people who thought he did it because he was arrogant. But the real reason Miles played this way was because it made it easier for him to give cues and signals - when to play and what to play - to his band. He once told a newspaper reporter who asked him why he played this way: "nobody ever asks classical orchestra conductors why they have their backs to the audience. The reason is that they're telling the orchestra what to play and when. You don't criticize them for doing it, so why do you criticize me for doing the very same thing." In the end, Miles was a man of few words, never
Miles Davis: The music’s right but the approach is wrong. Music listeners everywhere have heard at least a smidgen of the music from “the prince of darkness”. Although Miles Davis, dubbed the “most revered jazz trumpeter of all time, not to mention one of the most important musicians of the 20th century” by Rolling Stone Magazine and known as the birth of cool, attitudes and behaviors we never truly kind and the man was notoriously known as a jerk, his music was of great importance to the jazz…
Melanie Tapia February 4th, 2015 Period 2-Even Project Miles Dewey Davis III Born: 05/26/1926 (Alton, Illinois) Died: 09/28/1991 (Santa Monica, California) Biography Davis was born in Alton, Illinois, and raised in an upper middle class home in an East St. Louis home. His father was a dentist and his mother was a music teacher. Miles was given his first trumpet when he was 13 years old. He was a child prodigy. The mastery of his instrument grew rapidly under his influences of older jazzmen like…
Miles Davis Miles Davis is an American jazz musicians, he is a winner of 9 Grammy Awards and considered one of the top musicians of his era. He was a famous trumpet player, and songwriter, Davis was also known for being a bandleader and a composer. Davis was the first jazz musician to fuse both jazz and rock. This then introduced and new sound for others. Miles David legend is still growing strong even after his poor health and lack of creativity to jazz. Miles Dewey Davis was born on May 26, 1926…
Question 11 Miles Davis was one of the greatest and most important figures in jazz history. Miles Dewey Davis III was a musician, composer, arranger, producer and bandleader all in one. Davis was at the forefront of almost every major development in jazz after World War 2. He was one of the most influential and innovative musicians of the twentieth century along with Charlie Parker and Louis Armstrong. His versatility landed him at the forefront of bebop, cool jazz, modal, hard bop and fusion…
feeling of happiness but when the drug wears off, they crash even lower than before. It gets worse every time. Eventually, drugs will completely destroy all the creativity a person has. Drugs lead many great jazz musicians like Billie Holiday and Miles Davis to end of their careers and to their deaths. So why do jazz musicians take drugs? A survey done by Nat Hentoff in 1957 showed 409 New York City jazz musicians confirmed that more than half tried heroin and marijuana. Sixteen percent was regular…
song “strange fruit”, a political song that struck a chord for many Americans. Miles Davis musical aspect interests me the most because of his style that is easily recognizable and distinguished. His sound went on to influence many other newer forms of music today such as pop, soul, R&B, funk and rap. Davis employed a lyrical, melodic style that was known for its minimalism as well as introspection. After Miles Davis brief retirement he returned to the studio with his sextet to record perhaps one…
JAZZ Origins: Multicultural population of New Orleans Gospels and Spirituals African Drumming Caribbean Rhythms European Music Tradition Military Band Music Ragtime: Popular between 1895 and 1918. Its most important characteristic is the syncopate rhythm. It is a sort of modification of the "march" rhythm. Scott Joplin is perhaps the most celebrated musician associated with Ragtime. Blues: Blues could be defined as secular negro spiritual. Important Names Sippie Wallace Bessie Smith EARLY…
Miles popularized cool through his album, Birth of the Cool, but this is only mistakenly believed to be the start of cool, as it was already being played. “He had a style like the players from St. Louis, singing sound, and he didn't play too many notes or play those real fast tempos” (Davis 1989: 62). From Miles Davis’ autobiography, it is clear that he heard a style that was much slower than the bop he was…
stouyvesant High but did not graduate Early to mid 1940’s is when he started to play at the famous Mintons Playhouse, where he seemed to really come into his own being around other great jazz musicians such as Dizzy Gillepsie, Charles Parker, Miles Davis and many others His involvement in Minton is one aspect which drove Minton’s playhouse to be one of the biggest influences on the formation of Bee-Bop. One of the top genres of Jazz at the time. Monk said one of his biggest influences was Duke…
to drive and to take their cars to parking lots 50 miles from Sochi. Even tighter security pertains for screening Olympic visitors and support personnel at Olympic venues. An additional “prohibited zone” bans most access to the area inside Russia’s border with Georgia’s breakaway Abkhazia, to airspace and waters near the Olympics site, and to a national park. The zones stretch approximately 60 miles along the Black Sea coast and up to 24 miles inland. The interagency “Operational Headquarters”…