Miles Davis
Kind Of Blue

What critics will christen as one of the most elegant and refined sextets in jazz history comes together, between March 2nd and April 22nd of 1959, in a Columbia Records studio located in a former Orthodox church on East 30th Street in Manhattan, for two sessions where the general approach was to completely abandon chords in favor of the greatest freedom of modal scale improvisation which for the first time fully illuminated the jazz scene of the era, following the hints in Milestones, the first example of modal music.

The result is an indispensable and moving work, which a year ago saw the release of the Sony/Bmg Legacy edition in dual disc format, sold in millions of copies worldwide and which some critics claim represents the actual Bible that every enthusiast should know.

The perfect alchemy between the individual components that Miles Davis assembled around him seems truly miraculous when considering that in some cases only a few “takes” were enough to finalize the track for the record (“All Blues” was nailed on the first attempt). I was talking about the members, some of whom had been launched by the success of Miles Ahead, increasingly attuned from the dense live performances throughout 1958, representing the pinnacle for each single instrument; just think of the rhythm section with Jimmy Cobb (the drummer, and the only surviving member of the sextet) and Paul Chambers, the young and already very promising bassist, heir of Oscar Pettiford, who sets the tone for the first track on the album with a simple and strict rhythm over which all the solos of the piece would weave; to the winds featuring the great John Coltrane on tenor sax, also young and on the brink of his legendary “A Love Supreme” and on alto sax Julian “Cannonball” Adderley; to the piano alternating between the established and already idolized Bill Evans, for whom Miles admitted, “I designed the album around his piano style,” and Wynton Kelly, who was the official pianist at the time but makes only one appearance here replacing Evans on “Freddie Freeloader”.

And then there's HIM, Miles Davis with his trumpet, already a charismatic musician, confident, with several brilliant works behind him and rapidly rising to the rank of a true star in the jazz firmament. In short, in those days of '59, an explosive ensemble that could potentially do anything came together giving birth to something truly innovative and different. The album consists of 5 tracks (aside from the alternative take of “Flamenco Sketches”), four of which composed by Miles; only “Blue in Green” was composed by Bill Evans who, in the original liner notes, claims to have co-composed “Flamenco Sketches” with Miles.

The album begins with “So What,” perhaps the most known and famous track on the record, with absolute compositional transparency, with an introduction defined by many critics as “dreamlike,” preceding the actual opening theme by Davis (recognized by all critics as the moment of highest improvisation on the album) followed, on the rhythmic and piano base, first by the sax solos of Coltrane and Cannonball wandering in a chord-less world (the tenor being more fragmented compared to the more melodic alto), then by Evans who paints his shaded notes in chords contrapuntally resonating with the winds, before briefly leaving space for Chambers who reposes the theme, with the pianist accompanying him to the sudden close of the piece. “Freddie Freeloader,” inspired by a Philadelphia barkeep living off tips and freeloading whatever he could (freeloader, scrounger), is defined by Evans as “a twelve-bar blues, enlivened by a melodic character” highlighting Kelly's full sound qualities and liveliness as he opens with his relaxing and elegant solo, followed by Miles Davis's trumpet giving a sprint to the relaxing tone of the track with his sparkling surges, reaching a point where, changing tone, he realigns with Kelly's piano before Coltrane enters forcefully, following the track's rhythm without the harmonic changes typical of him at that time. Cannonball follows Coltrane almost as if continuing from him, making it difficult for the listener to discern when he joins in.

“Blue in Green” is perhaps the gem of the album, a delicate piece where, according to a chord scheme (moving away from the modal setup), solos by various instrumentalists follow one another, led by Davis's trumpet, over Evans's notes who had introduced the theme with the famous four airy bars, then reprised in his solo, followed by Coltrane, then Evans again and once more by Davis, creating a piece that borders on a minimalist and pure style, on the edge of hermetic poetry. “All Blues,” the last track recorded in April, is based on a background riff over which all the different instrumentalists revolve, with piano and drums establishing the rhythm before the winds delineate their plastic melodies (Chambers switches sticks when Miles does the second solo). Bill Evans's role in this piece is crucial, characterizing its modal aspect in counterpoint with Coltrane. Finally “Flamenco Sketches” is an example of reached balance between improvisation, elegance, moderation, and alternation, with Coltrane's solo being the pendant to Davis's solo in “So What”, albeit in more subdued and elegant tones.

In short, an album not to be missed, studied, listened to and listened again, for which it is also fun to try to download the “making of” found online, and then read the wonderful book by Ashley Kahn retracing the history of this absolute masterpiece.