Miles Davis | Biography, Albums, & Facts - Encyclopedia Britannica

Free jazz and fusion

The early 1960s were transitional, less-innovative years for Davis, although his music and his playing remained top-caliber. He began forming another soon-to-be-classic small group in late 1962 with bassist Ron Carter, pianist Herbie Hancock, and teenage drummer Tony Williams; tenor saxophonist Wayne Shorter joined the lineup in 1964. Davis’s new quintet was characterized by a light, free sound and a repertoire that extended from the blues to avant-garde and free jazz. Compared with the innovations of other modern jazz groups of the 1960s, the Davis quintet’s experimentations in polyrhythm and polytonality were more subtle but equally daring. Live at the Plugged Nickel (1965), E.S.P. (1965), Miles Smiles (1966), and Nefertiti (1967) were among the quintet’s timeless, influential recordings. About the time of Miles in the Sky and Filles de Kilimanjaro (both 1968), Davis began experimenting with electronic instruments. With other musicians, including keyboardists Chick Corea and Joe Zawinul and guitarist John McLaughlin, Davis cut In a Silent Way (1969), regarded as the seminal album of the jazz fusion movement. It was considered by purists to be Davis’s last true jazz album.

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Davis won new fans and alienated old ones with the release of Bitches Brew (1969), an album on which he fully embraced the rhythms, electronic instrumentation, and studio effects of rock music. A cacophonous kaleidoscope of layered sounds, rhythms, and textures, the album’s influence was heard in such 1970s fusion groups as Weather Report and Chick Corea’s Return to Forever. Davis continued in this style for a few years, with the album Live-Evil (1970) and the film soundtrack A Tribute to Jack Johnson (1970) being particular highlights.