Cool Jazz 1949 - 1955
Here is an example of Cool Jazz by Miles Davis
Miles Davis was born on May 26, 1926 and he died on September 28, 1991. His full birth name was Miles Dewey Davis III. Davis was born in Alton, Illinois. Then in 1927 his family moved to East St. Louis, Illinois. Davis’ father’s name was Miles Henry Davis and his mother’s name was Cleota Mae Davis. Miles started his interest in music at the age of 13 when his father bought him a trumpet and set up musical lessons with a local teacher named Elwood Buchanan. Although this was not really what people were doing at the time, teacher Buchanan stressed the importance of playing without vibrato. By the time Davis was 16 he was a member of the music society and playing professionally when not at school. When he was 17 he played for Eddie Randle’s band: “Blue Devils.” Davis graduated from East St. Louis Lincoln High school in 1944.
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Davis met and grew close with Canadian composer and arranger Gil Evans. In fact, Gil’s basement had become the meeting place for many young musicians and composers. For example, Davis, Roach, John Lewis, Gerry Mulligan all met there. They all had one thing in common (besides being musicians) they all did not like the new instrumental techniques that were taking over bebop. The nonet took off during the 1948 summer. They played for a while at the Royal Roost. The nonet was active until the end of 1949, with many people getting to play; Roach and Davis were constantly featured. Others that were also featured included: Mulligan, Bill Barber, and Lee Konitz. Having white musicians in a group of black musicians was unheard of at the time and angered a lot of people. Later the group got contract with Capitol Records made certain of many recording periods between January 1949 and April 1950. The things recorded were displayed 1956 on Birth of Cool, which led to the name "cool jazz." This was all started by the movement of Davis' group.
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