The musician Miles Davis accused of having an endless stream of ideas
How do you ever begin to describe somebody like Miles Davis? You can’t, but luckily, Davis managed to do it himself.
He was attending an awards ceremony at the White House and was making the necessary small talk with everyone around him. A woman spoke to him, whom he would later describe as a “politician’s wife”, and she asked him why he thinks America is starting to neglect jazz. Davis was brutally honest in his response as he said, “Jazz is ignored here because the white man likes to win everything.”
On the defensive, the woman speaking to Davis proceeded to ask him, “What have you done that’s so important in your life?” Davis gave the greatest response he possibly could, and in doing so, managed to succeed in describing himself, something that many have failed to do in the past. “Well,” he said, “I’ve changed music five or six times.”
Jazz opened a lot of people’s minds to music, as it was one of the first genres that was well and truly embraced, expanded and made to evolve. Whatever mood you were in, there was a jazz album for it, and Miles Davis was responsible for near enough all of them.
These are two extremes of one another, but Davis was able to master them and everything in between. It was by releasing these different albums, which spanned various kinds of jazz, that Davis was able to so effectively change music, like he said he did at the White House.
His live shows were equally impressive, as he would use his songs to set a foundation for a live performance but allow himself to improvise and make his music flow in the process. Nobody ever went to a Miles Davis gig and got the same damn thing twice. Davis championed this style of playing because it’s what always inspired him, and there was one artist in particular he thought mastered it exceptionally goddamn well.
Dizzy Gillespie was another jazz great and someone that Miles Davis always admired for his seemingly endless stream of ideas. When he was talking about musicians he loved, Davis made a point to bring up Gillespie and how much he enjoyed listening to him play.
“Trumpet players, like anybody else, are individualised by their different ideas and styles,” said Davis. “The thing to judge in any jazz artist is does the man project, and does he have ideas. You take Dizzy – he does, all the time, every time he picks up his horn.”
Davis is right, Gillespie was never short on ideas, and every time he played the trumpet, he allowed himself to be inspired by the present and conjure up whatever came to mind. This meant something sad, sweet, loving or angry; every emotion could be covered by Gillespie, trusting his instincts and playing what came to mind. When all your ideas can occur in the heat of the moment, you’re never going to be short on them.
