Grammy winning pianist/composer John Beasley is a very busy musician. Since 2011, he has served as music director for the annual International Jazz Day concerts, leading thirty world class artists on stages across the globe.
To celebrate the centennial of Miles Davis (whose band he joined in 1988), he’s assembled a group of all-star musicians including Sean Jones, Mark Turner, and Kurt Rosenwinkel. Beasley and his sextet “Unlimited Miles” explore four decades of Miles’ music through Beasley’s unique lens.
The group will perform on Wednesday, May 13th at 7:30pm at the Mondavi Center at UC Davis.
CapRadio’s Gary Vercelli recently sat down with Beasley to discuss his new project as well as his time with Miles Davis.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity
Interview highlights:
On joining Miles in 1988:
I was 28 and my wife was pregnant with our first child. I had already bought a house and I was doing a lot of studio work by that time. In fact, I was in the studio with Ricky Lee Jones and Walter Becker was producing, from Steely Dan. It was like this amazing situation. So I walked in and told them, you know, what had happened and I said I don't know, you know, I mean, I hate to leave this. And they basically pushed me out the door and said, “you got to go!” And I knew I wanted to go anyways. It's a gig that most musicians, jazz musicians in particular, would always want to play, you know. So I went!
On Miles’ unique ability to choose world class musicians and the magical ability to get the best out of them:
The thing about Miles was that without saying anything, he had this magnetism musically. You just latched on to him when he played. And my ears were never as good as when I was playing with Miles. I'd come off, you know, little tours, playing with other people, I could hear everything they do. And I was just so focused. And of course, you know, there's the things about him in my case, you know, he didn't want me using my left hand when I soloed. He said to me one time, right before we went on the stage, if you can't comp like Ahmad Jamal, then don't play, you know, things like that.
Some of his favorite Miles Davis recordings:
Nefertiti was one that I really wore out. ‘Round Midnight with Coltrane and Red Garland. I've just, since we started this project, got into like Birth of the Cool. It was never, never really paid that much mind, but I love that record. Filles De Kilimanjaro, both Tutu and Mandala are awesome.
On what made that “Kind of Blue” so special and widely appreciated:
I think for the general public, it's not a frantic record. It's a mood, it's a vibe, right? And because it was one of the first modal records, if you will, there's not a lot of tension. And if there is tension, it's released in a beautiful way. And I think that it's a record that, you know, if you have a young lady over at your house and you're on the couch, you put that record on and you can have a nice conversation and a nice romantic evening over that. So I think in a lot of ways, that's why the public embraced it like they did.
On Miles Davis’ ability to create space:
When I was with Miles, he didn't like piano players to comp for themselves, you know, like react or play a chord and play, play a chord and play. He liked that dry sound. And before that it was block chords, right? He'd tell Red Garland and Wynton Kelly, “I want block chords.” But what that means though, is that he's leaving space for the drummer and the bass player to react. So this is a way of him creating space within the rhythm section.So that was a big lesson. And if you listen to Herbie Hancock, Chick Corea, and Keith Jarrett, from that moment on, that's sort of the way they played.
