Miles Davis Research Paper

1296 Words6 Pages

1. Cool Jazz, is a style of Jazz that originated from the United States of America in the late 1940’s, after World War 2. This genre arose in popularity, as its slow subdued approach was much different compared to the other contemporaneous jazz styles. Lester Young first brought Cool Jazz up with his more relaxed style, lagging his beats behind. He was also more interested in exploring melodies, rather than rhythm. Miles Davis, one of the most famous figures, solidifies the genres by using lighter and relaxed sounds. Cool Jazz is mainly consistent of relaxed tempos and lighter tones. Its typical instruments include drums, piano, trumpet, trombone, saxophone, and the double bass. Cool Jazz was a blending of Jazz and Classical music; classical …show more content…

Miles Davis was an American Jazz trumpeter, bandleader, and composer. He is one of the most influential figures in the history of jazz. This is because of his interest in different styles, allowing him to come up with new ones, such as Cool Jazz. Davis started studying trumpet in his early teens. He played with Jazz band growing up in St. Louis area before moving to New York City to study in 1944. At school he skipped many of his classes, and was schooled through personal practice with Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker. Charlie Parker’s bebop quintet was Davis’ professional debut as a trumpeter. This lasted from 1945 to 1947. Davis’ early playing was not always in tune, but his imagination to find new melodies and rhythms outshined his technical flaws. He didn’t copy or mimic the style of. This is what made him such an important figure, as he was the basis of forming new genres that carried out and effectively influence the whole world of …show more content…

The sounds can be clearly heard with no instrument outshining any other, apart from the soloist. During the intro, the piano and double bass play simple chords very softly, mostly at mezzo piano level. The soloist’s first instrument, the trumpet, plays at normal level, which gradually increases during the song up to a mezzo forte level, then adds on during the end of its solo become louder with more accented notes. When the soloist instrument increases so does the accompaniment, rising slowly but gradually. During the break the volume of the music, falls back down to mezzo piano. The next instrument, the saxophone, plays exactly the same as the muted trumpet, however it plays louder during more parts than the trumpet. The final instruments solo, is the piano, which breaks off its chord progression to start playing its own melody at a very light tone. Its noise usually resides around mezzo piano, the same level it was playing the intro, as after the trumpet plays over it with louder and more stressed notes. During the outro of this piece, the instruments all fade out, leaving only the drums to play the final