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How Did Miles Dewy Davis Influence Jazz?

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(4) Born May 25, 1926, in Alton, Illinois Miles Dewy Davis the III was the son of an opulent oral surgeon who later moved the family south of Alton and to East St. Louis, Illinois where Davis would grow up. When Davis turned thirteen, he was given a trumpet for his birthday with included private lesson from Elwood Buchanan, a local jazz musician.(2) Buchanan stressed to Davis that he should learn to play the trumpet without vibrato. Vibrato was commonplace for trumpeters at the time, but going against the grain of the time gave Davis his distinct, clear sound. While in high school Davis played trumpet professionally and at the age of sixteen he was making good money working with the local band Randolph’s Blue Devils. From this he soon had …show more content…

(3) Bebop is a jazz style classified by having a more improvised fast tempo whilst having harmonic, rhythmic unpredictability; giving it a distinct style compared to normal jazz. (4) Davis did play a significant role in bebop’s beginnings, but he never confined himself to performing just that style. He actually curated many other forms of jazz such as hard-bop, fusion jazz, cool jazz and even modal jazz. (1) Davis began to form these sub-genres some years after being in a quintet led by Charlie Parker, a highly influential jazz musician who also laid down the foundations of bebop. With bebop on the rise, Davis soon felt a need to rid his music of the style, wanting to restore jazz's more melodic components. (5) So he moved into cool, fusion and modal jazz. (7) In 1959 Miles Davis released the album “Kind of Blue” which was created under the style of modal jazz. (11) Revolving around using musical modes and staying on fitting chords for most of the song, modal jazz was exceptionally different to bebop and other jazz styles that came before it. It holds striking contrast to the fast chords and continual scale changes that can be heard in bebop. The album “Kind of Blue” opens with the song So What; arguably Davis’

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