Miles Davis Sketches of Spain

Miles Davis with Quincy Jones & The Gil Evans Orchestra - Live At Montreux 1991 (2013) [720p BluRay Rip] {Eagle Rock}
MKV - > 2.74 Gb | 720p BluRay Rip H264 | 1280x720 (16:9) | DTS 5.1 @ 1509 Kbps | ~ 60 m
© 2013 Eagle Rock | 51807 3
Jazz / Modal Music / Trumpet

Miles Davis and storied producer/arranger Quincy Jones shared a long friendship and working history, despite the jazz trumpeter's legendary reputation as an intimidating and difficult collaborator. Their last partnership comes to light Tuesday in Miles Davis With Quincy Jones and the Gil Evans Orchestra Live at Montreux 1991, a concert from the Montreux Jazz Festival captured shortly before Davis died. Evans died in 1988.

After both John Coltrane and Cannonball Adderley left Miles Davis' quintet, he was caught in the web of seeking suitable replacements. It was a period of trial and error for him that nonetheless yielded some legendary recordings (Sketches of Spain, for one). One of those is Someday My Prince Will Come. The lineup is Davis, pianist Wynton Kelly, bassist Paul Chambers, and alternating drummers Jimmy Cobb and Philly Jo Jones. The saxophonist was Hank Mobley on all but two tracks. John Coltrane returns for the title track and "Teo." The set opens with the title, a lilting waltz that nonetheless gets an original treatment here, despite having been recorded by Dave Brubeck. Kelly is in keen form, playing a bit sprightlier than the tempo would allow, and slips flourishes in the high register inside the melody for an "elfin" feel. Davis waxes light and lyrical with his Harmon mute, playing glissando throughout. Mobley plays a strictly journeyman solo, and then Coltrane blows the pack away with a solo so deep inside the harmony it sounds like it's coming from somewhere else.

Miles Davis - Porgy and Bess (1958) {1997 Columbia Remaster}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC+CUE+LOG -> 325 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 133 Mb
Full Artwork @ 400 dpi (jpg) -> 29 Mb
© 1997 Sony Music / Columbia / Legacy | CK 65141
Jazz / Experimental Big Band / Cool / Modal / Bop

Of all Gil Evans' orchestral scores for soulmate Miles Davis, PORGY AND BESS is his richest and most ambitious–a watershed of modern jazz harmony which served to secure Davis' pop star stature and define his brooding mystique. Inevitably, even non-jazz listeners own a copy of PORGY AND BESS or SKETCHES OF SPAIN.

Like MILES AHEAD, Evans' band on PORGY AND BESS de-emphasized the traditional reed section in favor of a tuba, three French horns, two flutes and two saxophones. The resulting chords and overtones are dark, alluring and mysterious. Thus the opening brass-cymbal bluster of "The Buzzard Song" gives way to a mid-eastern carpet of flutes and deep brass as Davis' poignant trumpet speaks in split tones and yearning cadences, bursting with blues feeling; a tuba soon picks up the theme as muted trumpets are followed by tolling trombone/French horn chords.

Miles Davis - Tutu (1986) {2001 Warner Remaster}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC+CUE+LOG -> 255 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 96 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (png) -> 7 Mb
© 2001 Warner Bros. | 7599-25490-9
Jazz / Fusion / Jazz Rock

After 30-plus years with Columbia Records, Miles Davis departed to sign with Warner Brothers Records. TUTU finds Miles entering the world of MIDI, chaperoned by former sideman, Marcus Miller and pop jazz hitmaker Tommy LiPuma, and beat box music would never be the same again.
TUTU is the birth of a new kind of cool, based on the emblematic street beats of the mid-1980s, brimming over with orchestrally-styled keyboard programming. The album is a showcase for Miles' evocative muted horn, functioning like a featured vocalist. Not since his work with Gil Evans had Miles deferred so much to a collaborator, and TUTU is a platform for the arranging talents of Miller, who in addition to his distinctive, popping bass lines, plays nearly every instrument on the session–from keyboards to bass clarinet.

Miles Davis - Porgy and Bess (1958) {2006 DSD Japan Mini LP Edition Analog Collection SICP 1205}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 297 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 122 Mb | Full Artwork
© 1958, 2006 Sony Music Japan / Columbia | SICP 1205 | DSD | HQD High Quality Disc
Jazz / Cool / Experimental Big Band / Trumpet

Of all Gil Evans' orchestral scores for soulmate Miles Davis, PORGY AND BESS is his richest and most ambitious–a watershed of modern jazz harmony which served to secure Davis' pop star stature and define his brooding mystique. Inevitably, even non-jazz listeners own a copy of PORGY AND BESS or SKETCHES OF SPAIN.