Kind of Blue

by Miles Davis

Kind of Blue cover art
  • Type: Album
  • Released: August聽17,聽1959
  • Label: Columbia
  • Country: United States
  • Length: 45:26
  • Community rating: 4.56/5 from 113 ratings

Album Notes & Community Reviews

Kind of Blue dissolves the dense architecture of bebop, replacing its harmonic complexity with the elegant freedom of modal improvisation. Miles Davis guides his sextet not with rigid chord charts but with skeletal scales, creating a panoramic soundscape where space itself becomes an instrument. This radical shift toward melody and atmosphere fosters a sublime, contemplative dialogue between the players, most notably the contrasting poetics of John Coltrane and Bill Evans. In defining the very essence of cool, the album became jazz's most influential text and a universally acknowledged standard.

Genres

Descriptors: atmospheric

Tracklist

  1. So What (feat. John Coltrane, Cannonball Adderley & Bill Evans) (9:22)
  2. Freddie Freeloader (feat. John Coltrane, Cannonball Adderley, Wynton Kelly & Paul Chambers) (9:48)
  3. Blue in Green (feat. John Coltrane & Bill Evans) (5:37)
  4. All Blues (feat. John Coltrane, Cannonball Adderley & Bill Evans) (11:32)
  5. Flamenco Sketches (feat. John Coltrane, Cannonball Adderley & Bill Evans) (9:26)

Credits

  • Miles Davis - trumpet
  • Cannonball Adderley - alto saxophonist
  • John Coltrane - tenor saxophonist
  • Bill Evans - pianist, liner notes
  • Paul Chambers - bassist
  • Jimmy Cobb - drummer
  • Wynton Kelly - pianist on "freddie freeloader"
  • Irving Townsend - producer

More from Miles Davis: full discography