Artist:     Miles Davis

Album:     Birth of the Cool

Label:     Sony Music Entertainment

Release Date:     02.21.2020

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Last month’s PBS special Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool provided a rare look at one of the 20^th century’s most influential jazz masters. There’s now a companion album with musical highlights and commentary from the Stanley Nelson film. it’s a satisfying collection for novices as well as aficionados, with 14 career-spanning recordings and brief remarks from fellow jazz icons to introduce each track.

Not only was Miles Davis one of the greats, he played with the greats: Charlie Parker, John Coltrane, Cannonball Adderley, Wayne Shorter, Ron Carter, Gil Evans, Jimmy Cobb and on and on. They’re all here, from early tracks like “Donna Lee” with Charlie Parker to the previously unreleased “Hail to the Real Chief.” The Fifties were a particularly fertile period for Davis, beginning with the release of Birth of the Cool in 1954 through ‘Round About Midnight (1957), Kind of Blue (1959) and Sketches of Spain (1960). Each album is represented here with familiar cuts like “So What” and lesser-known choices such as “New Rhumba.”

By the late Sixties, Davis moved away from classic jazz in favor of a more electric sound with albums like Bitches Brew (1970) and in the Eighties drew upon world music influences. There are gaps in his career due to drug and health issues, but he continued to experiment and break new ground up until his death in 1991 at age 65. The commentary on the album provides insight into what made his music special (Herbie Hancock: “Miles had a way of playing that sounded like a stone skipping across a pond”) as well as his collaborative process with people like Gil Evans on Birth of the Cool (Ashley Kahn: “there was a level of mutual respect and mutual dedication to the music that created a melding of modern classical ideas with jazz”).

Always a controversial figure, Davis alternated between his “Picasso of Jazz” and “Prince of Darkness” personae. If you want to know more, the film Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool provides an in-depth look at the man while the album is a primer of his musical legacy.

—Lou Montesano