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On the 2nd of March 1959, a group of jazz musicians assembled at 30th Street in Manhattan, in a church that had been converted into a recording studio. Miles Davis, the group’s leader, had the vaguest sketches of melody lines.
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On the 2nd of March 1959, a group of jazz musicians assembled at 30th Street in Manhattan, in a church that had been converted into a recording studio. Miles Davis, the group’s leader, had the vaguest sketches of melody lines.
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“The first complete performance of each thing is what you’re hearing,” the pianist Bill Evans explained to the jazz writer Ashley Kahn. “First take feelings… they’re generally the best.”
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The producer was anxious that Jimmy Cobb’s snare drum was audibly vibrating in sympathy with the bass and piano. Miles wasn’t worried. “All that goes with it.”
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The piece begins with a soft, suspenseful duet between piano and bass, in a loose, flexible tempo.
Davis, John Coltrane and Cannonball Adderly join in on brass as the piece builds towards the solos.
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Davis, John Coltrane and Cannonball Adderly join in on brass as the piece builds towards the solos.
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90 seconds in, Jimmy Cobb hastily switches his brushes for sticks and gives the cymbal a whack that’s just a little too hard. Cobb expects Miles Davis to call a halt. Instead Davis launches into one of the most famous solos in jazz, with Cobb’s cymbal resounding underneath.
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It’s an electrifying combination, but at the instant the cymbal splash happened it must have seemed like a mistake. That ‘mistake’ is now immortalised at the start of Kind of Blue, a record that changed the course of 20th century music.
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“Honour thy error as a hidden intention,” say Brian Eno’s Oblique Strategies cards. Not easily done. Cobb and Davis did it.
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In his autobiography Davis comments, “I missed what I was trying to do on Kind of Blue.” Sure, it was a masterpiece. But it didn’t sound how he’d wanted or expected. “I just missed”. The ability to keep going, even when your plans are awry - not easy. https://amzn.to/2XhNCQT
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One of Jimmy Cobb’s many gifts was an ability to adapt to chaos. He was drafted into the band as an emergency replacement…
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…he got a call from Miles at 6.30pm to come play in Boston the same evening. “I was in New York and we hit at nine.” He dashed to Boston and set up his drum kit behind the musicians before joining in mid-song.
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Jimmy Cobb died on the 24th May. He’s the last surviving musician from the Kind of Blue sessions. He’ll be missed.
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I tell this story in my book Messy, which has less economics in it than you might imagine.
http://timharford.com/books/messy/
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http://timharford.com/books/messy/
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The original source, full of fascinating details, is Ashley Kahn’s wonderful book Kind of Blue: The Making of the Miles Davis Masterpiece.
https://amzn.to/2XMbM4T
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https://amzn.to/2XMbM4T
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Or maybe just put on the music and raise a glass to Jimmy Cobb.
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