August 2007

Cool School: Miles Davis & Stan Getz

Wednesday, August 01, 2007

"I like Stan because he has so much patience, the way he plays those melodies--other people can't get nothing out of a song, but he can. It takes a lot of imagination, that he has, that so many other people don't have."

-Miles Davis

In this selection from a February 18, 1950 WNYC broadcast, trumpet player Miles Davis and tenor saxophonist Stan Getz perform "Conception" live from the famous Birdland nightclub. Davis' arrangement for this number would later appear on his seminal "Birth of the Cool" album under the title "Deception," a nod to the song's composer George Shearing who recorded it a year earlier.

WNYC's aircheck from the Birdland session represents the only surviving record of this early collaboration between "The Prince of Darkness" and "The Sound." Accompanying Davis and Getz on trombone is J.J. Johnson, Tadd Dameron on piano, bassist Gene Ramey and Art Blakey on drums.