'Kind Of Blue' Recreated Note-For-Note
What happens when you make an exact copy of a jazz record, improvised solos and all? You're probably going to raise a lot of eyebrows. You might even make some people angry. But that didn't stop New York-based jazz quartet Mostly Other People Do The Killing from re-creating note-for-note one of the greatest jazz records of all time, Miles Davis's 1959 classic Kind Of Blue.
MOPDTK's newest album, Blue, raises a lot of questions, the most basic of which is simply, "What is jazz?" In a conversation with Soundcheck host John Schaefer, bandleader Moppa Elliott explains the origins of the project and its built-in difficulties.
"The most interesting thing about this whole project is the fact that it's impossible," Elliot says. "The reason it's impossible is all of the stuff that makes music great. It's impossible because you can't sound like John Coltrane or Miles Davis no matter how hard you try. So then the question is, how close can you get?"
How close did they get? Have a listen to the new version alongside the original in the conversation above, and let us know, could you tell the difference?
