Miles Davis

Near the end of the 1960s jazz trumpeter Miles Davis (1926-91) began to experiment with electronic instruments (primarily bass and piano) played by members of his groups. Within a short time Davis released two recordings, In a Silent Way (1969) and Bitches Brew (1969), that started a storm of controversy--although the latter record sold better than any album in jazz history. The problem as Davis saw it was that people were simply unprepared to listen to his new style of group improvisation because, first, it involved electronic instruments and rock beats and, second, it was too complex and unusual. But critics and fans who deplored the new direction complained that the music simply was not jazz, that Davis had "sold out" in order to attract the large white audience for rock music with a "fusion" of jazz and rock, and, in some cases, that his new music was a betrayal of his race and the great art invented and primarily played by African Americans.

The last of these objections to the music of that era, and to what followed in Davis' career, appears at first to contradict Davis' own image and his frequent assertion of the importance of race in jazz. In remarks made in a 1983 interview with Rolling Stone, for example, he speculated on what would happen if, after sixteen years as a black man he was offered the chance to become white. Suicide, he said, would be his only alternative,

'Cause whites have knowledge but no rhythm. Classical music was invented because white peo

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ations with Gil Evans, including Sketches of Spain (1959) and Porgy and Bess (1958), which became the standard for attempts to "fuse jazz phrasings, harmonies and tonal qualities with a classical orchestral scope" (Santoro 600). By 1962, although it would hardly seem possible, Davis "felt he had to redirect his music" and he hired a group of young musicians including Herbie Hancock (piano), Ron Carter (bass), and the 17-year-old Tony Williams (drummer) and worked in a mode critical of bop, but drawing on its strengths. With the addition of tenor saxophonist Wayne Shorter in 1964 the group moved into a new area--expanding the modal approach taken on Kind of Blue to "near-ultimate flexibility" on such albums as E.S.P. (1965) and Nefertiti (1967) (Santoro 602). The group began to shift as the members acquired sufficient fame and ambition to go out on their own and Davis continued to add new young musicians who included, over the next few years, Joe Zawinul, Dave Holland, Chick Corea, Keith Jarrett, and the guitarist John McLaughlin. But the move toward a fusion of rock and jazz proceeded gradually--and thoughtfully. Jazz guitarist George Benson was added to the ensemble for one number on Miles in the Sky (1968). Then Herbie H

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