An Afternoon Meditation with Miles Davis’ Bitches Brew
Over the last few weeks I have been doing a 20-30 minute afternoon meditation which has several times just turned into a power nap. Today unlike yesterday, I used a musical soundtrack. Now, the album Bitches Brew is not exactly your typical meditation music, it is however, an album that I used to sit and listen to on a weekend night when I was in college. Yes , on a quiet weekend night, the lights would go off in my dorm room and “Miles Runs Down the Voodoo” from side 2 of Bitches Brew would be spinning on my turntable.
Meditation Music? – Bitches Brew
This afternoon, however, I started with Side 1 of Bitches Brew. Mainly because the opening two songs of the album are so long! The opening track “Pharaoh’s Dance” is a few seconds over 20 minutes long. While track two the title track “Bitches Brew” is just short of 27 minutes In length.
I have written before that I started listening to Prog Rock a few years ago. My son Andrew always said I should because at all the concerts he went to many fans were graybeards like me! I soon discovered the reason was, we graybeards have been listening to progressive rock since the 60s and 70s Bands like The Moody Blues, Jethro Tull, King Crimson and Genesis are the founding fathers of the genre!
Miles Davis was one of the leaders of the progressive rock sub-genre of jazz rock fusion. His classic album Kind of Blue is the highest rated jazz-rock fusion album at Progarchives. While Bitches Brew checks in at number 10. You can see a complete list of the highest rate Jazz/Rock Fusion albums at Progarchives here
Miles Davis’s “Electric Period”
From Miles’ biography at Progarchives…..
….The “electric” period of Miles Davis started in 1969 and ended in 1975 when Miles retired due to health problems until the end of the seventies. In these years Miles distributed an important part to jazz rock. Columbia released four studio records ‘In a silent way'(1969), ‘Bitches Brew’ (1970), ‘A tribute to Jack Johnson’ (1970), ‘On the Corner’ (1972) and an important number of live records (some released on vinyl only in Japan) : ‘Black Beauty’/Live at the Fillmore West (1970), ‘Live-Evil’ (1970), ‘Dark Magus’ (1974) ‘Agharta’ (1975), ‘Pangaea’ (1975). A great part of the studio tracks recorded during these years were only released in the second half of the 70’s and first half of the 80’s on various compilations.
Miles’ Style Evolves
Beginning with ‘In a silent way’ Miles used mainly riffs or short segments and more often just simple rhythmic figures that would serve as a base for collective improvisation. At the same time the rhythmic changed from tertiary jazz rhythm to binary rock rhythm. Guitarist John Mc Laughlin became one of the key elements of the electric Miles sound.
Influenced by Jimi Hendrix and The Beatles, Miles Davis used during this period for the first time new studio techniques, new electronic instruments (among them the Fender Rhodes electric piano) and new sound devices, (Miles would use heavily the Wah-Wah pedal, popularized by Hendrix) to enlarge the sound spectrum of his music.
Miles was among the first musicians to realize the full potential of modern recording studios. He and his longtime producer Teo Macero recorded non-stop whole sessions, with the intention to choose and assemble the material afterwards. They would use this technique in an extensive way, especially on ‘Bitches Brew’, creating musical “puzzles” through multiple edits, up to a point where the original tracks are barely recognizable. (‘Pharaoh’s Dance’on Bitches Brew contained nineteen edits, including the use of tape loops, reverb & echo chambers). Read More
So if you’ve never listened to Bitches Brew give it a listen. It may not be the best music for meditating. But it is great to listen to with the lights down low. Here is “Pharoah’s Dance” to get you started.
