Miles Davis died on this day in 1991. It’s not a fact I have in memory; I heard it on the local Jazz station today at noon as I was driving downtown for lunch.
By 1991, I was aware of Miles only as an image on a stage blowing long (by that time, high, often shrill) notes that went on for days. Only in the last couple years have I become aware of Miles’ earlier work, an awareness that necessarily begets an understanding of how profoundly his musicianship influenced the one true American art form.
Miles was the third male in his family to get the name. When I was reminded today of the anniversary of his death, I wondered if his grandfather ever had any inkling of what he would become (Miles was the son of a well-off dentist father and Jazz pianist mother who hid her talent from him in the hope he’d stick with his violin lessons).
Someday I’ll be a seldom-read footnote in Ava’s biography. Maybe sooner than I could guess. If you have it at home, throw on “So What” and crank it up loud. If you don’t have it, go get it.