Miles & Quincy Live at Montreux

Miles & Quincy: Live at Montreux
Live album by Miles Davis and Quincy Jones
Released August 10, 1993
Recorded July 8, 1991
Length 56:45
Label Warner Bros.
Producer Quincy Jones
Miles Davis chronology
Doo-Bop
(1992)		 Live at Montreux
(1993)		 1969 Miles – Festiva De Juan Pins
(1993)
Quincy Jones chronology
Back on the Block
(1989)		 Live at Montreux
(1993)		 Q's Jook Joint
(1995)

Miles & Quincy: Live at Montreux is a collaborative live album by American jazz trumpeter Miles Davis and conductor Quincy Jones. It was recorded at the 1991 Montreux Jazz Festival and released by Warner Bros. Records in 1993. For the first time in three decades, Davis returned to the songs arranged by Gil Evans from his past albums, including Miles Ahead (1957), Porgy and Bess (1959), and Sketches of Spain (1960). This album was also the last album recorded by Davis (though recordings from nine days later, despite being recorded at Lyon, would be included on the "The Complete Miles Davis at Montreux" box set).

Miles & Quincy: Live at Montreux charted at number one on the Billboard Top Jazz Albums.[1] It won Davis his seventh Grammy Award for Best Large Jazz Ensemble Performance.[2]

Background

Miles Davis, who had never revisited past music from his career before, surprised jazz fans when he worked with an ensemble led by Quincy Jones at the Montreux Jazz Festival on July 8, 1991.[2] Jones developed the idea of using two orchestras and conducted both the Gil Evans Orchestra and George Gruntz Concert Jazz Band at the concert. The performance also featured guest instrumentalists who played with Davis, including trumpeters Benny Bailey and Wallace Roney, drummer Grady Tate, bassist Carles Benavent, and alto saxophonist Kenny Garrett.[3] Davis was seriously ill when he played the concert,[3] and it was the final album he recorded before his death three months later.[4]

Critical reception

Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
Allmusic[3]
Entertainment WeeklyA[5]
The Penguin Guide to Jazz[6]
Q[7]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide[4]

In a contemporary review for Entertainment Weekly, critic David Hajdu gave the album an "A" and said that it is "simply the most exquisite music of tragedy this side of a New Orleans funeral. Don't be mistaken though: This ain't no party. Nor is it a career-summing work of miraculous late-life virtuosity. It's something even rarer: an almost unbearably honest musical expression, without apology or shame, of weakness, age, and pain."[5] Q magazine found the sound thin, but funky and strong.[7] In a less enthusiastic review for Vibe magazine, Greg Tate found Davis' playing occasionally sketchy and felt that the recreations are not on-par with Evans' original arrangements: "[T]he compressed nature of this document—even its shadowy relationship to the original—only serves to highlight the nova-like luminosity of Gil and Miles's work together."[8]

In a retrospective review, Allmusic's Ron Wynn wrote that "not every moment is golden, but the overall session ranks just a bit below the majestic '50s and '60s dates featuring Davis' trumpet and Evans' arrangements."[3] In The Penguin Guide to Jazz, Richard Cook and Brian Morton said that the exaggerated arrangements are redeemed by the audience's enraptured reception and Davis' musical ideas, if not his labored solos: "Jones hails Miles Davis as a 'great painter' and that is exactly what he was. He left some masterpieces, some puzzling abstracts, and a pile of fascinating sketches."[6]

Track listing

  1. Introduction by Claude Nobs & Quincy Jones
  2. "Boplicity"
  3. Introduction to Miles Ahead Medley
  4. "Springsville"
  5. "Maids of Cadiz"
  6. "The Duke"
  7. "My Ship"
  8. "Miles Ahead"
  9. "Blues For Pablo"
  10. Introduction to Porgy and Bess Medley
  11. "Orgone"
  12. "Gone, Gone, Gone"
  13. "Summertime"
  14. "Here Come De Honey Man"
  15. "The Pan Piper"
  16. "Solea"

Personnel

Charts

Chart (1993) Peak
position
U.S. Top Jazz Albums (Billboard)[1] 1
U.S. Top R&B Albums (Billboard)[9] 86

See also

References

  1. 1 2 "Miles & Quincy: Live At Montreux - Miles Davis,Quincy Jones - Awards". Allmusic. Retrieved December 28, 2013.
  2. 1 2 "Miles Davis - Biography". Allmusic. Retrieved December 28, 2013.
  3. 1 2 3 4 Wynn, Ron. "Miles & Quincy: Live At Montreux - Miles Davis,Quincy Jones". Allmusic. Retrieved December 28, 2013.
  4. 1 2 Sheffield, Rob; et al. (2004). Brackett, Nathan; Hoard, Christian, eds. The New Rolling Stone Album Guide (4th ed.). Simon & Schuster. pp. 215, 219. ISBN 0-7432-0169-8. Retrieved December 28, 2013.
  5. 1 2 Hajdu, David (August 27, 1993). "Miles & Quincy: Live at Montreux Review". Entertainment Weekly. New York (185-186): 110. Retrieved December 28, 2013.
  6. 1 2 Richard Cook, Brian Morton (2006). The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings. Penguin. p. 332. ISBN 0141023279.
  7. 1 2 "Review: Miles & Quincy: Live at Montreux". Q. London: 143. November 1993. Retrieved December 28, 2013. ...the sound is sparse but fiercely heavy and funky...
  8. ↑ Tate, Greg (November 1993). "Revolutions". Vibe. New York: 103. Retrieved December 28, 2013.
  9. ↑ "Top R&B Albums". Billboard: 22. September 4, 1993. Retrieved December 28, 2013.
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