miles davis' bitches brew: overview and analysis

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Indiana University Bloomington Fall 2015 Mathilde Handelsman Mathilde Handelsman Jacobs School of Music Professor P. Harbison Jazz History 2 : 1950-69 Miles Davis’ Bitches Brew: overview and analysis "This music came at the end of the 1960s... after all the chaos.” —Quincy Troupe One of the best-selling albums of all times, Miles Davis' Bitches Brew marks a decisive moment in the history of jazz. Widely acknowledged as the beginning of fusion, or jazz- rock, it was recorded in August 1969 over the course of three days in New York City, and released in 1970 for Columbia Records. With its psychedelic tones, the use of electric instruments such as keyboard and guitar, and its numerous technological innovations, in collaboration with album producer Teo Macero, Bitches Brew comes as a logical continuation of Miles Davis' previous experimentations in his record of February 1969, In a silent way. But it also goes much further: through different textures, influences, and the radically new sound it brings, Bitches Brew is Miles Davis' electric period at its peak, and a true revolution. David Baker writes that there are only a few musicians in the history of jazz who succeeded, or even felt the need to renew their style as often and as brilliantly as Miles Page of 1 22

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Indiana University Bloomington Fall 2015 Mathilde Handelsman

Mathilde Handelsman Jacobs School of Music Professor P. Harbison Jazz History 2 : 1950-69

Miles Davis’ Bitches Brew: overview and analysis

"This music came at the end of the 1960s... after all the chaos.”

—Quincy Troupe

One of the best-selling albums of all times, Miles Davis' Bitches Brew marks a decisive

moment in the history of jazz. Widely acknowledged as the beginning of fusion, or jazz-

rock, it was recorded in August 1969 over the course of three days in New York City, and

released in 1970 for Columbia Records. With its psychedelic tones, the use of electric

instruments such as keyboard and guitar, and its numerous technological innovations,

in collaboration with album producer Teo Macero, Bitches Brew comes as a logical

continuation of Miles Davis' previous experimentations in his record of February 1969,

In a silent way. But it also goes much further: through different textures, influences, and

the radically new sound it brings, Bitches Brew is Miles Davis' electric period at its peak,

and a true revolution.

David Baker writes that there are only a few musicians in the history of jazz who

succeeded, or even felt the need to renew their style as often and as brilliantly as Miles

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Davis. — and, indeed, Bitches Brew came out ten years after 1959, or after Kind of Blue, 1

which itself forms the essence of "modal jazz”. Between the two, the evolution is

striking, in that both are just as equally groundbreaking, though in completely different

ways. With Bitches Brew, Miles Davis' eternal, mythical restlessness is expressed once

again, at a peculiar time in history, for jazz and music in general.

The jazz audiences of 1969 are no longer what they used to be. Culturally, it is the

year of Woodstock, of the summer of love, and for the new generations of the sixties—

black or white—, jazz has become music from the past: the trend now favors rock and

Motown. In 1969, Miles Davis, now in his forties, has just married twenty-four year old

Betty Mabry. For an artist who, all his life, will insatiably try to keep up with the trends

and create music "of his time”—succeeding, for the most part, in making it timeless—

the challenge now is to reach out to young, new generations. Betty's influence here is

undeniable: through her, Davis is introduced to the club and art scene of New York, and

meets young musicians such as Jimi Hendrix and Sly Stone, whom he has been listening

to with great interest. For Miles Davis, in his own words, it becomes evident that this is 2

the new direction to take:

"[...] once a style, whether original or copied, has been arrived at, in the majority of cases, it is impossi1 -ble to set it aside for a newer, more revolutionary one. The number of musicians [...] who have been able to generate more than a single innovation, or even modify their mature style, is, as we would anticipate, truly insignificant : Miles Davis, John Coltrane and perhaps Coleman Hawkins [...] are the only ones whose name come to mind." David Baker, The jazz style of Miles Davis : a historical perspective. Alfred Mu-sic Publishing, 1980.

"The music I was really listening to in 1968 was Jimi Hendrix, James Brown, and Sly Stone." Miles Davis, 2

Miles : The Autobiography, Simon and Schuster, 1990, p. 473.

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"What they [Columbia] didn't understand was that I wasn't prepared to be a

memory yet, wasn't prepared to be listed only on Columbia's so-called classi-

cal list. I had seen the way to the future with my music, and I was going for it

like I had always done. Not for Columbia and their record sales, and not for

trying to get some young, white record buyers. I was going for it for myself,

for what I wanted and needed in my own music. I wanted to change course,

had to change course for me to believe in and love what I was playing.” 3

Politically, the closing of the 1960s are a turbulent time for America: Vietnam war,

Civil Rights movements, the Kennedy assassinations, followed by Martin Luther King's,

but also the growth of radical feminism—all of which give way to more and more

groups of activists, massive demonstrations and militancy. This context of division and

disillusion among people has strong repercussions on the music being made. In fact,

the sixties are hard to define musically and stylistically precisely because so much is

going on at the same time. However, if there is a general attribute for the epoch, it

would be the word "freedom", which seems to embody the ideology of all the musical

styles from the sixties, on various levels: from free jazz to the lyrics of folk and/or

protest songs, from the avant-garde and experimental composers' desire to break free

from structures to the strong, assertive beat of rock music,... In this context, Miles

Davis holds an unusual place, as we will observe in this essay, for while he does not

adhere to any of those movements, he is undeniably and strongly influenced by all of

them.

idem, p. 298.3

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After a certain amount of preparation throughout July 1969, Miles Davis finally 4

books the Columbia studios on 52nd Street in New York City, from August 19 to 21,

bringing together, in this venture, no less than fifteen musicians—many of whom will

go on to leading their own bands and having high-profile careers, such as Joe Zawinul

and Wayne Shorter with Weather Report in the 1970s —toward the making of an album 5

which will eventually sell a half-million copies: Bitches Brew.

The original LP contains six tracks : Pharaoh's dance (on an original idea by Joe

Zawinul), Bitches Brew, Spanish Key, John McLaughlin, Miles runs the voodoo down

(homage to Jimi Hendrix' Voodoo Chile), and Sanctuary (composed by Wayne Shorter).

Everything, from the music to the album cover, the expressionistic painting by Abdul

Mati Klarwein, and the title of the album itself are provocative. The title, especially, is

very controversial for the time, as stated by Teo Macero :

"The word ‘bitches’, you know, probably that was the first time a title like that was

ever used. The title fit the music, the cover fit the music.” 6

Very much the result of a close collaboration between Miles Davis and producer Teo

Macero, the tracks also contain several edits and effects, with the use of new studio

technology.

Although Miles Davis, in his autobiography, makes no mention of it, and insists that the material 4

brought to the studio for recording had never been seen by any of the musicians, Joe Zawinul, as reported by Paul Tingen in his article for Jazztimes, reports that there were actually several rehearsals beforehand, and choice of material to be recorded.

Tingen, Paul. "Miles Davis and the making of Bitches Brew : Sorcerer's brew". Jazz Times, 2001. 5

idem.6

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I will first take a look at the unusual choice and number of instruments present on

Bitches Brew; I will then proceed to talking about the compositions themselves—from a

rhythmic, harmonic and structural point of view; lastly, structures will lead me to

comment on the inherent link between studio recording and composition on this

album, as well as the several possible influences of Miles Davis in regard to

experimentations in form, technological effects, aesthetics and philosophies, all of

which constitute Bitches Brew.

Analysis

1. Instruments: roles and interaction

The album presents a total of fifteen musicians, as listed below :

• Miles Davis - trumpet

• Wayne Shorter - Soprano sax

• Bennie Maupin - bass clarinet

• Chick Corea - electric piano

• Larry Young - electric piano

• Joe Zawinul - electric piano

• John McLaughlin - guitar

• Dave Holland - double bass

• Harvey Brooks - electric bass

• Lenny White - drums

• Jack DeJohnette - drums

• Billy Cobham - drums

• Don Alias - congas and drums

• Juma Santos - shaker, congas and percussion

• Airto Moreira - percussion

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The above list presents a very distinctive and original format, not only in terms of

number of musicians in the band, but in the choice of instruments and musicians

themselves. The triple pianos and drums, as well as the two basses, make for an

extremely dense texture; the electric guitar is definitely a new sound for jazz, and one

Miles Davis is keen on exploring in his new style; as for the bass clarinet, played by

Bernie Maupin, it adds an unusual, contrasting and rich color to the general texture—at

times, it can almost be heard as another bass line, because of the register.

There are many layers on each track of this album. The roles of each instrument are

therefore very different from the ones constituting the sound of the 1950s, in which we

find a hierarchy between the timbres—here, there is none. On that subject, George

Grella, in his work on Bitches Brew, says the following :

"Bitches Brew places everything on the same sonic level, and Western music

of almost every kind, especially popular music, is made almost entirely with

a hierarchy of values between soloist (or lead voice of some kind) and en-

semble that came to be seen as a de facto requirement." 7

Not only are each instrument indeed "on the same sonic level", but the roles that they

play are also similar and less defined than in "traditional" jazz that came before. In this

context, it becomes more and more difficult to talk about a "rhythm section", since

every instrument seems to be a part of it, including the bass clarinet.

Grella, George, Jr. Miles Davis' Bitches Brew. New York : Bloomsbury, 2015. 7

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This full, ambient sound that these textures generate is very similar to that of

psychedelic rock albums of the exact same time, particularly Pink Floyd's The Piper at

the gates of dawn (1967) and Jimi Hendrix' Electric Ladyland (1968), which is certainly no

coincidence. This full texture also creates the impression that there are no real solos in

any of the pieces, whereas in fact each one is a combination of solos put together. Davis'

trumpet-playing is the only instrument that is put forward in the sound mix, so that we

hear a sort of dialogue, an interplay between him and the mass of instruments.

Similarly to the role Davis opted for in other of his albums, such as Kind of Blue or

Sketches of Spain, once again, he acts here as a "guiding voice", without which this music

could easily become static. 8

Sometimes, an instrument will be brought out distinctively, and gradually fold back

into the general texture: the bass clarinet at the beginning of "Bitches Brew", for

instance, is suddenly brought out by itself, before its motif is looped and therefore

turned into an ostinato, which then becomes a bass line over which layers of

instruments build up, and progressively fades out. Such instrumental interventions

have a quasi illusory aspect to them: they come and go so briefly, and do not linger in

our ears very long, so that one almost wonders if they actually took place.

As for the drumming styles of Lenny White, Billy Cobham and Jack DeJohnette (whom

Davis chose for "his deep groove" ), they sound closer to funk and rock rather than the 9

cf. Paul Tingen.8

Miles Davis, Autobiography, p. 312. 9

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ones that come from traditional jazz. The groove installed reminds us at times of

Ginger Baker's on Cream's 1967 Disraeli Gears , and other times of the funk rhythms of 10

James Brown.

One can also add that, for the first time, Miles Davis chooses to record with

musicians who aren't necessarily jazz musicians, such as bassist Harvey Brooks, from

Jefferson Starship.

2. Rhythm, harmony and form

The rhythms are often said to stem clearly from African music, "with the rhythms

built by adding beats on top of each other rather than subdividing in the Western

manner." The beginning of "Pharaoh's dance", for example, is clearly non-Western in 11

its rhythmic approach, from how the drums and percussions interact with the rest of

the instruments.

As stated above, the influence of rock and funk are obvious, but there are also several

passages on this album where time is suspended, and where drums and percussions are

coloring freely, within the flow of textures, rather than laying down any kind of groove.

In general, the harmony is minimalistic, based on just a few chords. It mixes

different modes and tonal centers, with an emphasis in the solos on whole-tone and

octotonic scales. The improvisations on the three keyboards are very chromatic, with

n.b : in regard to this particular album, one could even wonder if there is any relation between Miles 10

Davis' choice of name, "Bitches Brew" and Cream's song "Strange Brew", from Disraeli Gears, as this pre-cedes it of two years.

cf. George Grella. 11

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step / half-step ambiguity revolving around one note—such processes that one

frequently finds in Bartok and Messiaen, as well as atonal and/or modal composers of

the time, such as Maurice Ohana. Some moments are in fact atonal (for example,

approximately one minute of "Bitches Brew", between 16'00" and 17'00"), but as usual, it

shifts very fast and, in the same way as what we described earlier with instruments

appearing and disappearing, the moment is brief. On his compositional process

concerning harmony, Miles Davis recalls :

"I had been experimenting with writing a few simple chord changes for three

pianos. [...] So I had been writing these things down, like one beat chord and a

bass line, and I found out that the more we played it, the more it just kept get-

ting different.[…]This started happening in 1968, when I had Chick, Joe and

Herbie for those studio dates. It went on into the sessions we had for In a Silent

Way. Then I started thinking about something larger, a skeleton of a piece. I

would write a chord on two beats and they'd have two beats out. So they would

do one, two, three, da-dum, right? Then I put the accent on the fourth beat.

Maybe I had three chords on the first bar. Anyway, I told the musicians that

they could do anything they wanted, play anything they heard but I had to have

this, what they did, as a chord. Then they knew what they could do, so that's

what they did. Played off that chord, and it made it sound like a whole lot of

stuff." 12

"Pharaoh's dance" opens with a melodic pattern in E dorian, which is the piece's

signature motivic element, around which the improvisations revolve; even if, through

the use of various modes in the solos, the piece seems to leave its original harmonic

context, the E dorian is always in the background, if only in the auditor's memory.

Miles Davis, Autobiography, p. 299. 12

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Noticeably, Wayne Shorter's solo around 11'48", using the whole-tone scale, shares

many similarities with patterns often found in Messiaen's works.

"Spanish key", set on a deep, funk groove, and based on several scales, appears as a

reminiscence of Davis' previous explorations on Sketches of Spain, opening with the

phrygian scale, which comes back regularly throughout the piece, as a structural

element.

Structurally, the pieces on Bitches Brew redefine the concept of the jazz tune

completely, starting with their extended duration. The longest pieces, "Pharaoh's dance"

and "Bitches Brew" respectively last 20 and 27 minutes! But even the shorter ones are

by no means "short", by comparison with the standards of jazz albums until then. Beside

the limitations brought by technological factors pre-1960, with restrained recording

space, the idea of form for a 20 minute piece doesn't match well with the usual, formal

criteria of blues and jazz. In that respect, the pieces on Bitches Brew are not tunes at all:

they are recorded, almost free improvisations, or, to quote Paul Tingen, "a jungle

environmnent that one can enter and roam". 13

The 1960s coincide musically with a period when the concept of tune itself, or "theme",

tends to disappear. This is particularly the case in classical music, for instance, with the

post-serialists, but also the electro-acoustic, minimalist, and even musical theater

movements in Europe, not to mention musique concrète, in which there is no concept 14

Article for JazzTimes, 2001. 13

e.g. George Aperghis. 14

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of melody whatsoever. It appears that, in every kind of music being created in the

Western world in the sixties, whether it's funk, pop or rock, the concept of "tune" has

become somewhat archaic (even if it expresses itself on different levels for each type of

music); the theme is no longer predominant in the music, but blends more and more

with its accompaniment, in favor of the general atmosphere. This is illustrated by our

ear being naturally drawn to the arrangement, or elements thereof, in a piece, rather

than the actual theme: horn lines of a James Brown song, the guitar ostinato of Jimi

Hendrix' 1983, a merman I shall turn to be, etc.

However, the pieces on Bitches Brew are not free, and they do contain an internal,

functional structure of their own. In his autobiography, Miles Davis says, about the

recording sessions of Bitches Brew: "I brought in these musical sketches that nobody

had seen, just like I did on Kind of Blue and In a Silent Way.” — yet several of the 15

musicians on Bitches Brew, including Joe Zawinul and Lenny White, refuted this fact

later on, by acknowledging that there were, in fact, some rehearsals beforehand, to

prepare the sessions. This seems logical for Miles Davis, who did not adhere to free jazz

at all, and preferred to work "freely" within an established frame: what he referred to as

controlled freedom. 16

This only partly explains why the pieces on Bitches Brew feel structured. One of the

most important aspects of this album, as we shall examine in the next part, lies in the

Miles Davis, Autobiography, p. 299.15

"Look, you don't need to think to play weird. That ain't no freedom. You need controlled freedom." 16

Miles Davis, reported in Berendt and Huesmann's The Jazz Book, p. 126.

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many technological edits made by Teo Macero, especially on the first two tracks; these

edits are, in fact, crucial factors in the structuring of the pieces on the album.

3. Recording innovations: an integral part of the composition

What Miles doesn't actually say in his autobiography is, probably, how important Teo

Macero's role was in the making of the album. Today, it is generally admitted that the

record is a direct result of their strong collaboration. Miles Davis gave 'carte blanche' to

Macero in regard to the post-production edits, which are considerable. The title track

itself contains fifteen edits , with the use of effects including tape editing, loops, delay, 17

echo, reverb and phase shifting. These effects, however, aren't simply there for the sake

of effects — they actually contribute to the structure of the piece as a whole. Some of

the loop effects, for instance, isolate certain phrases from free improvisations and, by

repetition, turn them into thematic elements. This process of composition is very

similar to the explorations of Steve Reich taking place at the same time, with works

such as Come out (1966), Violin phase (1967), or, later on, Different Trains (1988).

"Half a year later a record came out that was totally different, because

they’d taken the front end of one tune and put that in the middle and so

on. Basically Teo Macero had made a whole other thing out of it. I suspect

that Miles said to Teo: ‘Go ahead and do what you think best,’ and that

Miles then approved or disapproved what had been done."

Paul B. Cherlin and Guerino Mazzola. Flow, gesture, and spaces in free jazz : towards a Theory of Collabo17 -ration. Springer, 2008, p. 105.

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Lenny White 18

Therefore, in editing and rearranging, using new studio technology, Macero played an

integral part in creating the structure of the pieces and had a tremendous importance

in the compositional process.

A Juilliard graduate, Macero was a composer and arranger himself, and contributor

to the 3rd Stream movement. According to Paul Tingen, Macero's classical music

influences can be found in the sonata-like structures he gave to the pieces on Bitches

Brew, notably "Pharaoh's dance" and "Bitches Brew" :

"In “Pharaoh’s Dance” the section 00:00 to 02:32 can be called the

exposition, since it contains two basic themes, with theme number one first

played between 00:00 and 00:15 and theme number two at 00:46. Starting at

02:32 is a solo section, or “development,” containing references to the

material of the “exposition” at 02:54 and 07:55. A dramatic section is edited

in between 08:29 and 08:42, with tape delay added to Miles’ horn, then

repeated at 08:44 to 08:53, and followed by a one-second tape loop that

repeats five times between 8:53 and 9:00. When Miles at long last plays

Zawinul’s stirring main theme (referred to earlier in the track, but never

actually played), at 16:38, it can be considered the coda."

Whether one adheres to this idea or not, it is clear that the role of the recording studio

here is not only that of "an instrument alongside the others" , but also an indissociable 19

aspect of the musical conception and composition of the album.

quoted in JazzTimes, 2009. 18

Berendt and Huesmann, The Jazz Book, p. 128. 19

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Lastly, this also points toward similar innovations made during the same time by The

Beatles—who, by now, had more or less stopped performing and become "studio

artists”—with the Double White album, and, later on, Abbey Road: the progress in studio

techniques created a revolution of their own.

4. Music of chance

"As the music was being played, as it was developing,

Miles would get new ideas. This was the beautiful thing about it"

Jack DeJohnette

With the concept of music being composed as it is being played, Miles points toward

yet another musical movement of the same epoch: indeterminacy. Lead principally by

John Cage in the sixties, the movement of indeterminacy in music relies solely on

hazard and chance in regard to forms and structures of a piece. In that respect, it is also

close to the ideas put forth by the free jazz courant, also taking place at the same time.

Although Miles Davis is known to have severely criticized both Ornette Coleman and

Cecil Taylor, often in scathing words , it is no coincidence that his music cohabited in 20

the same era as that of his two colleagues, and of the avant-garde music movement of

the sixties in general. As often it happens, musicians belonging to a same epoch find

themselves connected, driven by more or less unconscious acts in their creative

process.

idem. p. 126.20

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"So I would direct, like a conductor, once we started to play, and I would

either write down some music for somebody or I would tell him to play

different things I was hearing, as the music was growing, coming together. It

was loose and tight at the same time. It was casual but alert, everybody was

alert to different possibilities that were coming up in the music. While the

music was developing I would hear something that I thought could be

extended or cut back. So that recording was a development of the creative

process, a living composition." 21

Lastly, we will add that, although Davis was certainly not a partisan of free jazz, the

musicians he collaborated with (Tony Williams, Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter and Wayne

Shorter) all played "free" on their own records. 22

5. Non-Western conception of time

One other major trend pervading the 1960s is the general enthusiasm for Asian, and

particularly Indian, philosophies, spirituality and art. The hippie culture, especially,

rediscovers classical Indian art and music; travels to Asia become, at the time, more

frequent among the new generations, along with the practice of meditation, attendance

of spiritual meetings with gurus, etc. In music, the sound of the sitar finds its way more

and more (The Beatles, for instance, as early as 1966, with Revolver), as well as tablas.

Classical Indian music is very much a reflection of the Eastern philosophy in regard

to time, duration and continuation. Where the Occidental vision tends to perceive the

Miles Davis, Autobiography, p. 299. 21

idem.22

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notion of time as a progression toward a finality, containing a beginning and an end,

the Eastern world thinks of it in terms, rather, of renewal and circularity. Musically, 23

this expresses itself through repetition and reiteration of patterns (ostinatos, drones,

etc.), such as one finds in the various layers of Balinese gamelan, for instance. The

music oscillates around one or several poles, and stays there, in a state of, so to speak,

meditative contemplation. There is no perspective of "achievement" whatsoever —

whereas all traditional forms of Western music, from the sonata to the blues, stem from

the idea of constant going back and forth between tension and resolve. The Western

harmonic expectations are therefore not the same as Oriental ones.

In Miles Davis' Bitches Brew, with the absence of chord progressions also comes the

disappearance of the Western ear's expectations regarding harmony, beginnings and

endings, as well as the changes that occur in between. The pieces on this album exist

solely for themselves, there is no progression: they flow freely from one point to the

other, with brief moments that come and go, without the aesthetic satisfaction of

cadences and resolutions one finds in Western music. In spite of all the structural

aspects one can identify in the pieces, as described in the previous chapter about Teo

Macero, this is, at least, how it primarily comes across to our ears. In regard to this,

George Grella says the following :

"Listening to the album creates expectations that are never fulfilled, because

underneath what it seems to sound like, and how many units it moved,

cf. George Grella : "Outside of the West, a circular view of time is more common and prominent, even 23

in societies that have undergone Western-style industrialization – there is no assumption of linear progress. Time does not fly off into the future : it marks cyclical events."

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there's so much more. The album regards the idea of musical resolution —

reaching a final point — as irrelevant. [...] What is more subtle, but profound,

is that by using rhythm, pulse, and harmonies — and tape composition —

that by design did not resolve, Miles was organizing time: and both form and

time are conjoined in the music. Miles' push to move form away from the

demands of resolution and finality was a push into a different, and, for

American listeners, unfamiliar concept about time." 24

Whether Miles Davis was doing this consciously, in direct reference to the Eastern

world, or not, is unclear; but the influence, if only semi-conscious, is there: it is simply

part of the cultural environment Miles Davis finds himself in at the time of the record.

We will also note that the unusual length of the pieces on this album are quite

representative of this new way of conceiving time. It is closely related to the hippie

generation, of course, and the use of hallucinogenic drugs, which were a somewhat

indissociable part of the epoch, and which had a tremendous influence on the arts.

However, the enthusiasm of Western artists toward the Oriental esoteric, hermetic and

Buddhist philosophies started much earlier in the history of music, and was one of the

major influences on music making in Europe at the end of the 19th and beginning of

the 20th centuries. Claude Debussy, for one, was greatly influenced by the Oriental

conception of time, which is reflected in his music post-1900. He was one of the first 25

to use processes of spatial and temporal organization in his music which were

influenced by the Oriental philosophy, or the idea of an eternal starting over of time—

Grella, George. Miles Davis' Bitches Brew. New York : Bloomsbury, 2015. 24

Or, after the two Expositions universelles in Paris, where he was able to hear Catalan music, as 25

well as Balinese gamelan.

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using, among other things, drones and repetitions—which in turn influenced

generations of composers to follow. Below are four examples of 20th century pieces

(openings), which were written using these concepts of repetition and oscillation,

influenced by the Asian philosophy of time, and which reveal how it is a recurring

source of inspiration throughout the 20th century :

Example 1 : Debussy - Masques (1904)

Example 2 : Messiaen - Reflets dans le vent (1928)

Example 3 : Ligeti - Der Zauberlehrling (1990)

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Example 1 : Debussy - Masques (1904)

Example 2 : Messiaen - Reflets dans le vent (1928)

Example 3 : Ligeti - Der Zauberlehrling (1990)

Example 4 : Berio - Feuerklavier, from the 6 Encores (1989)

14

Example 1 : Debussy - Masques (1904)

Example 2 : Messiaen - Reflets dans le vent (1928)

Example 3 : Ligeti - Der Zauberlehrling (1990)

Example 4 : Berio - Feuerklavier, from the 6 Encores (1989)

14

Example 1 : Debussy - Masques (1904)

Example 2 : Messiaen - Reflets dans le vent (1928)

Example 3 : Ligeti - Der Zauberlehrling (1990)

Example 4 : Berio - Feuerklavier, from the 6 Encores (1989)

14

Indiana University Bloomington Fall 2015 Mathilde Handelsman

Example 4 : Berio - Feuerklavier, from the 6 Encores (1989)

Conclusion

In the late 1960s, as socio-political upheavals are shaking up the country, musicians,

parallel to the Civil Rights movement, are also searching for freedom. Whether it is

sung by Aretha Franklin (Think, 1968) or expressed through John Cage's open forms and

abolition of traditional structural systems, the idea of freedom is more present than

ever in artistic creation.

Bitches Brew is generally acknowledged as the "birth of fusion"; but if that term,

"fusion", is relevant to this album, in a way it is also limited, and constricting, for music

that, in fact, finds its sources of inspiration in several other stylistic and/or aesthetic

areas—as shown in previous parts of this essay. Miles Davis even mentions Stravinsky,

when talking about his first harmonic explorations leading to In a Silent Way. It is 26

"It was funny because I used to think when I was doing them [simple chord changes] how 26

Stravinsky went back to simple forms.", p. 299.

Page � of �19 22

Example 1 : Debussy - Masques (1904)

Example 2 : Messiaen - Reflets dans le vent (1928)

Example 3 : Ligeti - Der Zauberlehrling (1990)

Example 4 : Berio - Feuerklavier, from the 6 Encores (1989)

14

Indiana University Bloomington Fall 2015 Mathilde Handelsman

striking to remark, however, that, with all the similarities we can find between Bitches

Brew and its contemporaries, this record brings a unique and truly innovative sound for

the time, placing Miles Davis, once again, as one of the major music makers of the 20th

century.

Furthermore, whether one talks about fusion or Third Stream, or other terms yet, the

idea at the core which binds them remains the same: genres coming together in one.

This defined not only most of what was being created during the late sixties, but

practically everything that is being done today. With this in mind, one could say that

the album Bitches Brew is not only an example of fusion, but is essentially

representative of the epoch it was created in.

Page � of �20 22

Indiana University Bloomington Fall 2015 Mathilde Handelsman

Bibliography

◆ Alkyer, Frank ; Enright, Ed ; Koransky, Jason. The Miles Davis Reader:

Interviews and features from Downbeat Magazine. Hal Leonard

Corporation, 2007.

◆ Baker, David. The jazz style of Miles Davis: a historical perspective.

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◆ Berendt, Joachim-Ernst and Huesmann, Günther. The Jazz Book: from

ragtime to the 21st century, trans: H. and B. Bredigkeit. Chicago:

Lawrence Hill Books, 2009.

◆ Cherlin, Paul B. and Mazzola, Guerino. Flow, gesture, and spaces in free

jazz : towards a Theory of Collaboration. Springer, 2008.

◆ Cook, Richard. It's about that time: Miles Davis on and off record.

Oxford University Press, 2007.

◆ Cook, Richard and Morton, Brian. The Penguin Jazz guide: the history of

the music in the 1000 best albums. New York : Penguin Group, 2010.

◆ Davis, Miles and Troupe, Quincy. Miles: The Autobiography. Simon and

Schuster, 1990.

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Indiana University Bloomington Fall 2015 Mathilde Handelsman

◆ Grella, George, Jr. Miles Davis' Bitches Brew. New York: Bloomsbury,

2015.

◆ Holaway, Nathan. "1959, the most creative year in jazz". All About Jazz,

2015.

◆ Southall, Nick. "Miles Davis - In a Silent Way". Stylus, September 2003.

◆ Svorinich, Victor. Listen to this: Miles Davis and Bitches Brew.

University Press of Mississippi, 2015.

◆ Thibault, Matthieu. Bitches Brew: ou, le jazz psychédélique. Marseille:

Editions Le Mot et le reste, 2012.

◆ Tingen, Paul. "Miles Davis and the making of Bitches Brew: Sorcerer's

brew". Jazz Times, 2001.

◆ Wayte, Lawrence, A. Bitches Brew: the progeny of Miles Davis's Bitches

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