Miles Davis

American jazz trumpeter, bandleader, and composer (1926–1991)

Audience24.2K
Fame80.6
Momentum20.0

Source-basedFalling

24.2K youtube followers

Audience24.2K
Fame80.6
Momentum20.0
Musicians rank#241
Wikipedia383.7K

Lived 1926–1991, aged 65United States

United States MusiciansSinger / Musician

Biggest on YouTube
24.2K
@Miles Davis - Topic
Wikipedia
86 languages
Cross-language footprint
Era
1926–1991
Aged 65
Known for
Scrooged
1988

Summary

Updated 2026-06-20

He kept turning the corner just as the rest of jazz caught up. Five decades, maybe seven distinct styles — bebop, cool jazz, modal, fusion — and each time he moved, the genre's center of gravity moved with him.

Biography

About

Miles Dewey Davis III was born into an upper-class Illinois family in 1926 and picked up trumpet as a teenager. He dropped out of Juilliard to play in Charlie Parker's bebop quintet, then recorded the Birth of the Cool sessions that helped define that sound. A heroin addiction shadowed the early 1950s, but a comeback at Newport in 1955 led to Columbia Records and 'Round About Midnight with John Coltrane and Paul Chambers. Kind of Blue followed in 1959 — still the bestselling jazz album ever, more than six million copies worldwide — and through the 1960s he cycled lineups and styles, from orche…

Voice

In their own words

Sourced, dated quotes from Miles Davis

Miles Davis

said21 Mar 1973

My ego only needs a good rhythm section.

— In "My ego only needs a good rhythm section" is also the title of an interview/article by Stephen Davis for The Real Paper (21 March 1973)

Miles Davis

said18 Jun 1964

What am I supposed to say to that? That's ridiculous. You see the way they can ____ up music? It's a mismatch. They don't complement each other.

— Assessing the Ellington/Mingus/Roach recording of the Ellington-Tizol composition "Caravan", from ; in s "Blindfold Test" (June 18, 1964);

Miles Davis

said18 Jun 1964

Take it off! That's some sad ____, man. In the first place, I hear some Charlie Parker cliches. . . . They don't even fit. Is that what the critics are digging?

— Reviewing "Lena" from Taylor's in DownBeats "Blindfold Test" (June 18, 1964); reproduced in The Encyclopedia of Jazz in the Sixties (1966)

Miles Davis

said1962