Miles Davis

Jessika Grindstaff October 3, 2014 History of Jazz The Evolution of Free Jazz Free Jazz is a form of jazz that involves collective improvisation without a set chord or rhythm structure. This type of jazz was born during the social, political and civil movements’ era, the sixties. There are many reasons that free jazz was formed, the main one being the limitations in other forms such as bebop, big band and swing. Free jazz was influenced by the works of Cecil Taylor, Ornette Coleman and John…

Canadian jazz quartet Peripheral Vision is known for breaking off into modern sound-shapes and bringing influences from a variety of genres, with predominance of jazz and rock. Co-led by guitarist Don Scott and bassist Michael Herring, who often have art, literature, and standup comedy inspiring their compositions, the band is rounded out with saxophonist Trevor Hogg and drummer Nick Fraser. Their fourth outing, More Songs About Error and Shame, comprises seven well-worked compositions (Herring…

Duke Ellington was born on April 25, 1899 in Washington, D.C. Dukes parents were James Ellington and Daisey Ellington. They were both pianists. Duke Ellington’s inspiration was probably his parents because he was playing piano as a child and focused more on music than his education. Since his parents played piano he was playing piano. What made him famous was that he was pretty much the first one to conduct and make a big-band jazz group. He also led his band for more than a century. Every in…

more free and fun style, giving musicians more freedom to play music how they like and how they choose to when it comes to entertaining audiences. There are two main musicians who are an example of jazz at its finest, and they are Miles Davis and Steve Reich. Miles Davis is an example of a jazz musician who chose to explore into the musical genre, always up for a challenge and something new to try. He brought many new and exciting changes to the jazz genre while he was living, and still…

My interest in the musical genre of Jazz begins with an introduction to the song So What by Miles Davis from the Kind of Blue album []. At the time, my musical taste were more volume driven like bands such as Black Flag, Metallica, and Slayer where the only requirement was to increase the volume to match their intense sound. As I sat down and listen to the first minute of “So What”, my first immediate reaction was the realization of how soft and desolated the song felt with barely any…

The Miles Ahead movie is very different from the previous jazz performances I attended, of course that was anticipated considering it's a movie about Miles Davis not an actual live concert. To start, I did not like this movie. To me, the movie portrayed Miles Davis as a bad-ass, ready to kill man, instead of a wonderful performer which he was and still is. The Evolution of Jazz book depicted Miles Davis differently than the movie did, in the textbook they showed Miles as a musician ready to…

attribute that Miles has that draws me to him is his passion. Never did he ever let his passion, which he found at such a young age, die. Miles used his passion to forever leaves his mark not only on the jazz world but the whole musical world. His influence was at the cutting edge of bebop, jazz fusion, cool jazz, modal jazz, and hard bop. His influence knew no bounds, not even death. in 2009 the House of Representatives passed a bill that would preserve jazz as a national treasure due to Miles…

I am a sophomore who has learned a lot of useful knowledge and loves my life in UC Davis. Yet, I am writing to point out problems with the quarter system. Similarl to many aggies, in my first college year, I had a hard time adapting to the university life because of the quarter system. To succeed in university, every UC student must spend a lot of time adapting this depressive and painful system. However, after acclimating this schedule, students still need to bear massive stress and many…

needed, as Kevin Lynch and Gary Hack state in their essay, design is not restricted to genius (Lynch, Hack, 1984). I am not an expert in the field of environmental design or any type of design for that matter, but I am a student and a part of the UC Davis community, therefore I feel that my point of view is valid. We must make the MU Terminal an…

“UC Davis Career and Internship Fair” This fall I started my journey with UC Davis. Davis is a really exciting, new and challenging chapter in my life. I moved from San Mateo, where I lived with my fiancée, to an apartment in Davis where I live on my own. Starting new school, and being surrounded by many new faces is not easy. I am not a person who can easily meet and connect with new people. UC Davis offers a lot of events for its students, some of them are very exciting like the…