Miles Davis - 1957 [2005] "Round About Midnight"

Miles Davis ‎– 'Round About Midnight
Recording sessions took place at Columbia Studio D on October 26 1955, and at Columbia's 30th Street Studio on June 5 and September 10 1956. 'Round About Midnight' is widely recognized by jazz critics as a landmark album in hard bop and one of the greatest jazz albums of all time.

With the release of the spectral title tune, and the efforts of the Columbia marketing and publicity departments behind him, a thirty-year old Miles Davis entered into a period of extraordinary artistic maturity and growth. And Miles instinctively knew how to cultivate his star quality. Looming behind those shades, was the diffident, sensitive anti-hero--proud and defiant--who only spoke to his audience through his horn, and turned his back on them when the other soloists were blowing.

The combination of attitude and intellect was irresistible. Beginning with ROUND ABOUT MIDNIGHT and proceeding through a remarkable succession of famous recordings over the next 30 years, Miles Davis became one of the greatest soloists, arrangers and talent scouts in the history of American music. People who didn't own a single jazz record came to know his name--Miles was a jazz icon.

His famous intro on the title tune is based on mentor Dizzy Gillespie's arrangement, and Miles' tone, always a strong point, has here matured into something deeply personal and unique. His provocative use of space and silence--matched only by Lester Young, Billie Holiday and Thelonious Monk--sets up the famous release and Coltrane's agitated statement. Here and on the Prestige recordings, Coltrane found his voice as Miles' foil, while "The Rhythm Section" (pianist Red Garland, bassist Paul Chambers and drummer Philly Joe Jones), became the most celebrated in jazz--capable of smooth, bouncy delicacy ("Dear Old Stockholm," "All Of You" and "Bye Bye Blackbird"), hard swing ("Tadd's Delight") and relentless complexity (Charlie Parker's contrapuntal "Ah-Leu-Ch"). A masterpiece.

At the Newport Jazz Festival in 1955, Davis performed the song "'Round Midnight" as part of an all-star jam session, with the song's composer Thelonious Monk, along with Connie Kay and Percy Heath of the Modern Jazz Quartet, Zoot Sims, and Gerry Mulligan. Davis's solo received a positive reception from many jazz fans and critics. His response to this performance was typically laconic: "What are they talking about? I just played the way I always play." George Avakian of Columbia Records was in the audience, and his brother Aram persuaded him that he ought to sign Davis to the label.

Davis signed with Columbia and formed his "first great quintet" with John Coltrane on saxophone. 'Round About Midnight was his first album for the label. He was still under contract to Prestige, but he had an agreement that he could record material for Columbia to release after the expiration of his Prestige contract. Recording took place at Columbia studios; the first session was on October 26, 1955 at Studio D, during which the track "Ah-Leu-Cha" was recorded with three numbers that did not appear on the album. This is the first studio recording of the quintet. The remainder of the album was recorded during sessions on June 5, 1956 ("Dear Old Stockholm", "Bye Bye Blackbird" and "Tadd's Delight") and September 10, 1956 ("All of You" and the titular "'Round Midnight") at Columbia's 30th Street Studio. During the same period, the Miles Davis Quintet was also recording sessions to fulfill its contract with Prestige.

These Miles Davis sessions for Columbia, from 1955 and 1956, are usually overshadowed by a quartet of albums (Relaxin', Workin', Steamin' and Cookin') Davis recorded for the Prestige label in the same period and with the same band.

Davis and a new quintet, including a then little-known saxophonist called John Coltrane, hastily cut those great discs to discharge their contractual obligations to Prestige before moving to Columbia. It turned out to be the most inspired period of work for one of the most inspired groups in jazz history. The spare and elliptical trumpet phrasing of Davis hypnotically contrasted with the striving ferocity of Coltrane's tenor sax, and a jazz rhythm section (this one included drummer Philly Joe Jones) had never before sounded so unerringly swinging and yet so effortlessly and provocatively flexible. Moreover, Davis was on his way to being unofficially elected the crown prince of cool. He had triumphantly returned to playing after a layoff to disentangle from heroin, and with his shades, sharp suits and imperious manner, he looked every inch a young man who had come back with the keys to the city for modern jazz.

What makes this Round About Midnight package different from earlier Columbia issues of the same material is that the six tracks from the original LP are now augmented, not only by bonus studio takes but by Miles Davis's famous duet with Thelonious Monk from the 1955 Newport Jazz Festival, and previously unissued concert material from the quintet's tour early the following year.

The appearance at Newport, with Davis an informal guest, was the episode that restarted the trumpeter's stalled career. Playing on Monk's composition Round About Midnight, he curls slow notes around the pianist's hammer-and-anvil chords as an intro, plays a quick, dancing figure and then a long, arching sound to bring himself within range of the theme. He keeps sidestepping the melody and simultaneously hinting at it, with soft hovering sounds and shrugging upward slides, and typically balances sighing, suspended sounds with lightly blown double time. Monk, meanwhile, keeps threatening to bring the piece to a dead halt, with grumpy, full-stop chords and preoccupied, boogieing figures. It's a classic jazz collaboration, and after that performance everybody wanted to know the 29-year-old Miles Davis all over again. Recruiting his brilliant quintet soon followed.

The studio material also kicks off with the title track, this time featuring the trumpeter's famous muted sound in slow, weaving counterpoint with Coltrane. Charlie Parker's vivacious Ah-Leu-Cha is a dialogue between the horns and drums, Bye Bye Blackbird an object lesson in tantalising behind-the-beat timing, and a nimble Two Bass Hit and Bud Powell's boppish Budo are among the studio tracks added from the same period.

But it's the live material on the second disc that is the most absorbing. Apart from the Newport performance, six tracks from a 1956 concert in Pasadena catches the freshly ignited energy of this new group, with Davis often operating in the fast, twisting bebop-rooted style that preceded his more famous free-modal and fusion approaches of the decades to follow. The empathy of the whole group on theme statements and the driving presence of Jones is clear on an account of Walkin' in which Davis brilliantly deploys only a sparing selection of notes and pauses. There's a lovely ballad account of It Never Entered My Mind and a breakneck jitter through Dizzy Gillespie's Salt Peanuts. Impresario Gene Norman's short interview with Davis inadvertently sounds hilariously like an old Lenny Bruce sketch, which all adds to the period interest.

 Track listing:

CD 1
01     'Round Midnight     5:55
02     Ah-Leu-Cha     5:53
03     All Of You     7:01
04     Bye Bye Blackbird     7:53
05     Tadd's Delight     4:26
06     Dear Old Stockholm     7:49
07     Two Bass Hit     3:45
08     Little Melonae     7:18
09     Budo     4:14
10     Sweet Sue, Just You     3:39

CD 2
1     'Round Midnight     5:54
    All Selections Below Recorded Live 2/18/56
    All Previously Unreleased
2     Introduction By Gene Norman     1:37
3     Chance It (aka Max Is Making Wax)     4:34
4     Walkin'     9:24
5     Gene Norman & Miles Davis     1:06
6     It Never Entered My Mind     5:17
7     Woody 'N You     5:46
8     Salt Peanuts     4:35
9     The Theme     0:19

Personnel

    Miles Davis – trumpet
    John Coltrane – tenor saxophone
    Red Garland – piano
    Paul Chambers – double bass
    Philly Joe Jones – drumset

Newport personnel bonus disc track one

    Miles Davis – trumpet
    Zoot Sims – tenor saxophone
    Gerry Mulligan – baritone saxophone
    Thelonious Monk – piano
    Percy Heath – double bass
    Connie Kay – drumset