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Title: Miles Davis: The Definitive Biography by Ian Carr ISBN: 1-56025-241-3 Publisher: Thunder's Mouth Press Pub. Date: September, 1999 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $18.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.73 (11 reviews)
Rating: 3
Summary: Disappointing but worth reading for fans
Comment: As I sure has already been pointed out, this is not, as Carr claims, a definitive biography of Miles Davis. Rather, it is simply a pretty good analysis of his musical career. You do not come away from the book feeling like you really know who Miles Davis was. While Carr does talk some about Miles' personal life, he does not dig too far beneath the surface, and does not provide the intimacy or the detail necessary for the reader to gain a real understanding of Miles the person. One gets the sense that Carr would have viewed a more extensive discussion of Miles' personal life as somehow sensationalistic. This is unfortunate, as it is difficult to fully understand the music without understanding the man.
As far as the musical analysis of Miles' work goes, it is quite extensive and generally pretty decent. However, Carr does tend to be VERY opinionated about just about every major issue in jazz and this can be frustrating as he has a tendency to dismiss opinions contrary to his own as stupid or ignorant without debating the merits. As a result, Carr often comes off as arrogant and condecending. Also, as I believe has already been pointed out, he goes to great pains to set up what I believe to be a false dichotomy between "Western" and "Non-Western" influences in jazz. He sees Western influences as inferior and scorns jazz musicians who incorporate too much Western influence into jazz (i.e. the cool jazz movement). He even implies that Wynton Marsalis is somehow less of a jazz musician because his classical trumpet playing.
Overall, it is a useful guide to Miles' musical career, but don't expect anything close to a "definitive biography".
Rating: 4
Summary: A wealth of detail in a flawed biography
Comment: Carr's book does an outstanding job discussing the musical evolution of Miles Davis, providing (for some albums) astute, song by song analysis. The wealth of detail, seemingly accurate for the most part, does make this a definitive biography. Unfortunately the book is marred by an extremely narrow thesis, namely that Davis progressively rejected white, Western music for a more "organic" black music. This thesis manages to be both racially offensive (Carr routinely dismisses white jazz players, even those Davis admired himself), as well as providing a very limited view of the musician's career. Indeed Carr has very odd (and negative) ideas of "Western" music, suggesting that it encompasses both the "free" elements of atonality and randomness as well as the "planned" elements of musical notation and arrangement. Carr also verges on hero worship in some passages of the book, conveniently explaining away various temper tantrums, acts of violence, and rudeness toward fans on his subject's behalf. Despite these misgivings, the work still provides a unique vantage on Davis' life and creative drive.
Rating: 4
Summary: Great, exhaustive effort
Comment: Ian Carr's book on Miles is complete, fairly even-handed and really tries to capture Miles as both a Musician and a budding painter and importantly as an individual. It relates the large roller coaster of Miles decade by decade at the top of his game and then coming down, getting involved with seedier elements and then somehow surviving and coming back up to ascension. Anyone who respects the Jazz genre owes it to themselves to read this book if only for the history involved, because during all the twists and turns in Jazz, especially from the Bebop era on, Miles was there, and his place as a central character is assurred, among the Jazz Greats.
The only reason I just gave it 4 stars instead of 5 is that I read Miles' own autobiography a bit later, and although he throws f-bombs throughout that book, I feel that it is still a better book because it comes from the mind of the Man himself.. This is still a great chronology, definitely worth checking out.
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Title: Miles by Miles Davis ISBN: 0671725823 Publisher: Simon & Schuster Pub. Date: 01 August, 1990 List Price(USD): $15.00 |
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Title: So What: The Life of Miles Davis by John F. Szwed, John Szwed ISBN: 0684859823 Publisher: Simon & Schuster Pub. Date: 29 October, 2002 List Price(USD): $28.00 |
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Title: Kind of Blue: The Making of the Miles Davis Masterpiece by Ashley Kahn, Jimmy Cobb ISBN: 0306810670 Publisher: Da Capo Press Pub. Date: 18 September, 2001 List Price(USD): $16.00 |
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Title:The Miles Davis Story ASIN: B00007CVRL Publisher: Sony Music (Video) Pub. Date: 21 October, 2003 List Price(USD): $14.98 Comparison N/A, buy it from Amazon for $13.48 |
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Title: A Love Supreme: The Story of John Coltrane's Signature Album by Ashley Kahn ISBN: 0670031364 Publisher: Viking Books Pub. Date: 24 October, 2002 List Price(USD): $27.95 |
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