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A milestone in Jazz finally rescued from sonic oblivion!
Notes on this release
The listener to this remastered recording may feel that my priority was Miles Davis' trumpet. Well, yes and no. Of all the musicians here it is of course Miles who we wish to hear as clearly as possible. But we are fortunate that it is his soloing, and that of saxophonist James Moody, which was best picked up by the microphone, and which best cuts through the murk of the original recording. Dameron's piano is much further back, and whilst I've been able to round out the deep double bass notes, the drums remain thudding rather than bright. Yet these are perhaps secondary concerns. With a recording such as this we want to hear the young Miles cutting loose and free, in front of an adoring audience and effectively leading his own small group for the first time - and just before he succumbed to a drug addiction that would keep him out of the public eye for several years. So excuse a little hiss and occasional crackle, live with the fluttery sound on Embraceable You (on which a lot of wayward pitch correction has been possible), and listen at long last to this vital moment in modern jazz history, now sounding hugely better than any other issue since those May nights in 1949.
Click here to view additional notes
Miles Davis
Miles Dewey Davis Jr. (May 25, 1926 – September 28, 1991) was an American jazz trumpeter, bandleader and composer. Widely considered one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century, Davis was at the forefront of almost every major development in jazz from World War II to the 1990s. He played on various early bebop records and recorded one of the first cool jazz records. He was partially responsible for the development of modal jazz, and jazz fusion arose from his work with other musicians in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Davis belongs to the great tradition of jazz trumpeters from the Southern United States that started with Buddy Bolden and ran through Joe "King" Oliver, Louis Armstrong, Roy Eldridge and Dizzy Gillespie. His greatest achievement as a musician, however, was to move beyond being regarded as a distinctive and influential stylist on his own instrument and to shape whole styles and ways of making music through the work of his bands, in which many of the most important jazz musicians of the second half of the Twentieth Century made their names. Davis was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on March 13, 2006. He has also been inducted into the St. Louis Walk of Fame, and the Big Band and Jazz Hall of Fame.
Notes from Wikipedia - for full biography: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miles_Davis
Tadd Dameron Tadley Ewing Peake (Tadd) Dameron (February 21, 1917 – March 8, 1965) was an American jazz pianist, arranger, and composer. Dexter Gordon called Dameron the "romanticist" of the bop movement. Born in Cleveland, Ohio, Dameron was the most influential arranger of the bebop era, but also wrote charts for swing and hard bop players. The bands he arranged for included those of Count Basie, Artie Shaw, Jimmie Lunceford, Dizzy Gillespie, Billy Eckstine, and Sarah Vaughan. He wrote "If You Could See Me Now" for Sarah Vaughan and it became one of her first signature songs. He also arranged and played for rhythm and blues star Bull Moose Jackson. Also playing for Jackson at the time was Benny Golson, who also was to become a celebrated jazz composer; Golson has said Dameron was the most important influence on his writing. Dameron composed several bop standards, including "Hot House," "Our Delight," "Good Bait," and "Lady Bird." Dameron developed an addiction to narcotics toward the end of his career. He also suffered from cancer and had several heart attacks before he died at the age of 48 of cancer in 1965.
Notes from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tadd_Dameron
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