EQ Magazine - March 2009 - (Page 28)

The 50th Anniversary of Kind of Blue The best-selling jazz album of all time, the stark modal style of Miles Davis’ Kind of Blue has inspired countless musicians—everyone from the Doors and James Brown to Weather Report, Q-Tip, and Portishead. Recorded in 1959, at Columbia’s legendary 30th Street Studio in Manhattan—which also was the home for celebrated recordings by Bob Dylan, Aretha Franklin, Johnny Cash, Billie Holiday, Charles Mingus, and Sly & The Family Stone—Kind of Blue was the dividing line between Davis’ cool period, and the exploratory music that began with his revolutionary ’60s quintet. Housed in an abandoned Greek Orthodox church at 207 East 30th Street, 30th Street Studio measured 100 feet by 100 feet with very high ceilings and gorgeous wooden arches. The enormous space was converted to suit the acoustic desires of each artist with the use of gobos and baffles, allowing the studio to record everything from small jazz groups to pop singers to massive choral and orchestral pieces. “I always liked the drum sound in there,” says Jimmy Cobb, the last surviving member of the Kind of Blue band. “You could play the way you wanted to play, because the engineers had control over everything. They knew every spot on the floor where the drums would sound best. For the Kind of Blues sessions, they put a mic right close to the cymbal, so you can hear it ping—you clearly hear the wood of the drumstick against the cymbal. I think there was one mic positioned overhead, one mic placed between the snare and hi-hat, and maybe one more mic near the front of the drums.” Produced by Irving Townsend with engineer Fred Plaut, Kind of Blue brought together the greatest jazz musicians of the era: pianists Bill Evans and Wynton Kelly, tenor saxophonist John Coltrane, alto saxophonist Julian “Cannonball” Adderley, drummer Jimmy Cobb, and acoustic bassist Paul Chambers. It was supposed to be just another recording session before the band returned to the road, but Davis enforced a template of instantaneous creation by handing the compositions to the musicians practically on the spot, and insisting on cutting the pieces in one complete take. “He liked the energy in the first take,” says Cobb. “Miles always felt like the more you did it, the worse it was going to get. And with those kinds of musicians, you could just tell them what you wanted, and they’d give it to you the first time.” To commemorate the album’s 50th anniversary, Columbia Legacy has issued Kind of Blue: 50th Anniversary Collector’s Edition—a comprehensive box set that includes two CDs, a DVD, and a 180-gram, blue vinyl LP. CD One encompasses the March 2, 1959 session that produced Kind of Blue’s “Freddie Freeloader,” “So What,” and “Blue in Green;” the April 22, 1959 session that brought forth “Flamenco Sketches” and “All Blues;” and some false starts and studio sequences. CD Two presents a May 26, 1958 session— the only other studio recording of the sextet (Davis, Evans, Coltrane, Adderley, Cobb, and Chambers)—with producer Cal Lampley that produced “On Green Dolphin Street,” “Fran-Dance,” “Stella By Starlight,” “Love for Sale,” and “So What,” as well as a 17-minute live version of “So What” captured at an April 1960 concert in Holland. The DVD includes interviews with prominent musicians, as well as the complete 1959 television program, Robert Herridge Theatre: The Sound of Miles Davis. The vinyl LP is a worthy addition to this historical box set. MASTERING FOR VINYL Given the task of remastering Mark Wilder’s 1997 two-track remix of Kind of Blue for the 50th Anniversary Collector’s Edition, mastering engineer Greg Calbi broke out his usual setup at Sterling Sound: a Studer A80 2-track, Digidesign Pro Tools, The original Blue men (left to right): John Coltrane (tenor sax), Cannonball Adderley (alto sax), Miles Davis, and Bill Evans (piano). 28 EQ MARCH 2009 www.eqmag.com http://www.eqmag.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of EQ Magazine - March 2009

EQ Magazine - March 2009 Contents Talk Box Sounding Board Mr. Scruff Apollo Sunshine Al Schmitt Toolbox Third Eye Blind Kind of Blue Guitar Trax Bass Management Key Issues Drum Heads Vocal Cords Mix Bus Cheat Sheet Ableton Live Vocal Tools Gadgets & Goodies Room with a Vu

EQ Magazine - March 2009

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