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Miles Davis concluded a most successful year in 1955 from many
standpoints. His playing was sharper than it had been in some time and as
lyrical and probing as ever. Critics and fans alike reacclaimed him as the
leading trumpeter in numerous articles and several polls. As the year drew to a
close amid these tributes, Miles formed a new group. He had been fronting
quartets and quintets intermittently throughout the year and the personnel had
been a shifting one. When his current group was formed on a regular basis it
needed differentiation from the previous transitory fives. Hence, the new
Miles Davis quintet which translated means Miles Davis' new quintet. Without
revision the ambiguity contains valid meaning in each of its members.
The New Miles Davis Quintet actually had its forerunner in Miles'
last LP, The Musings Of Miles (PRLP 7007). Cut prior to the actual
formation of the new group, this recording date had Red Garland and "Philly"
Joe Jones on board. Using these two Philadelphians as a nucleus, Miles added
tenorman John Coltrane, also from the Quaker City, and the youthful bass star
from Detroit, Paul Chambers.
Jones has been with Tadd Dameron and Tony Scott and is one of the
hardest swinging drummers right down to his powerful brush work.
Garland is an ex-boxer (he fought Sugar Ray Robinson in the '40s)
whose leaping, happy single line style is sometimes joined by his locked hands
chordal method.
Coltrane's style is a mixture of Dexter Gordon, Sonny Rollins and
Sonny Stitt. "Trane" previously was with Dizzy Gillespie in Diz's last big band
of 1949.
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Chambers, who made a tremendous impression on New Yorkers at the
Cafe Bohemia during 1955 with George Wallington, is one of the most facile
soloists to come along in many a how high the moon.
This LP consists of four standards and two originals. In choosing
the standards, Miles has come up with two rarely done in How Am I To Know?
and There Is No Greater Love and two done not much more often in S'posin
and Just Squeeze Me. The originals are the highly intriguing Stablemates
by Benny Golson (another Philadelphian) which has Miles at his searching best,
and The Theme so called because the group uses it as a sign-off. This
tune is also used as a sign-off theme by the Messengers. Here it gets a sendoff
from a fine Paul Chambers solo.
Squeeze Me finds Miles in a delicate mood and he continues
this, becoming more tender and caressing on There Is No Greater Love with
a complementary locked hands bit by Garland.
How Am I To Know? features a driving Miles with Chambers
and Jones laying down a rock ribbed beat.
S'posin finds Miles muted as he is on all the standards,
(he's open on the originals) and still swinging but in a more insinuating way.
notes by IRA GITLER
photo, supervision by Bob Weinstock
engineering by Van Gelder
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Users of wide-range equipment should adjust their controls to the RIAA curve
for best results.
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