When challenged with the question, “What have you done that’s so important in your life?” at a White House dinner in 1987, Miles Davis simply responded, “Well, I’ve changed music five or six times.” And he was right.
Trumpeter, bandleader, and composer Miles Davis is one of the most celebrated and influential jazz musicians in history. It wasn’t so much a signature sound that made Davis such an icon, but the fact that his sound was always evolving. Throughout his career, Davis experimented with a wide range of musical styles, keeping him at the forefront of many major changes in the jazz world over several decades.
Miles Davis | Source: David Redfern/Redferns/Getty Images
This June, The Western Australian Jazz Project (WAJP) will pay homage to Miles Davis’ remarkable life and music with a very special concert, Miles: Explorations of the Dark Magus. The 17-piece band made up of internationally acclaimed musicians will premiere new adaptations of Davis’ music with Grammy Award-winning Lucky Oceans as narrator.
"The most extraordinary thing about Miles Davis’ music is its unparalleled and constant level of change and renewal. Miles' composition – like his bandleading, performance, and recording – renewed and changed itself by including generous input from the great musicians and conceptualists who moved through his band.” – Lucky Oceans
Davis’ collaborations with a variety of different musicians resulted in the popularisation of many new styles of jazz. These include, among others, cool jazz, characterised by relaxed tempos and light tones; modal jazz, which focuses on musical scales rather than cords; hard-bop, which incorporates the groovy sounds of R&B and gospel music; and fusion, a polarizing style which combines jazz harmony and improvisation with other genres, such as rock and funk.
Miles Davis | Source: Gai Terrell/Redferns
Davis’ music has influenced some of the 20th and 21st-centuries’ most popular recording artists spanning a range of genres, including Prince, Carlos Santana, Rick James, Kendrick Lamar, Radiohead, and Lana Del Ray, just to name a few.
“Of all the wonderful songs in the program, I’m most excited for audiences to hear ‘Prince of Darkness’ from the album Sorcerer. The quintet is in its infancy and you can hear the struggle as they push each other to discover new ways to play in the jazz idiom. It reflects our own goal to ‘do jazz differently.” – Adrian Kelly (WAJP Managing Director and Trumpeter)
We are beyond thrilled to be hosting a concert that pays tribute to not only one of the most important figures in jazz history, but music history as a whole.
Don’t miss Miles: Explorations of the Dark Magus on Friday 17 June. Find tickets and more information.
