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by IAmBroom 119 days ago
Jimmy wasn't as good as Miles at collaboration.

Miles always impressed me with his ability to pick the best to back him up, and /then/ let them take the front. Some tracks he barely plays on, waiting minutes for his entry.

Jimmy wanted the best to back him up. But I agree with you; I'm just pointing out why I think he didn't.
2 comments
jawilson2 119 days ago
Agreed! Like Pharaoh's Dance on Bitch's Brew, Davis doesn't come in for like 4 minutes. Same with In A Silent Way. He just lets the band groove for a while, THEN takes the lead.

In Davis' autobiography, he mentions trying to work with Jimi. I don't think it would have worked really, but who knows. Jimi was completely self taught, while Miles went to Juliard, I don't see how they would have communicated musically, literally. Like, if Miles tells Jimi to try a diminished chord here, or some modal scale there, Miles would have ended up doing a LOT of teaching along the way. And I say this as a guitarist of 30+ years who loves both of them.

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Slow_Hand 118 days ago
Considering that Miles was firmly in a modal music phase at that point, I don't see Jimi's lack of formal training as a hindrance at all. I think he'd be able to hang just fine with Mile's band. Even if Jimi couldn't read changes on a chart, I'm sure he'd have no problem working it out by ear.
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jawilson2 118 days ago
I'd like to think that, I love this period from Davis, and love Hendrix, so it would have been great to see a collab.

In terms of communication, I am thinking of something like the musical equivalent to software design patterns, etc. I.e. imagine two devs are pair coding, one of whom has a CS degree from 2002 and one is skilled but self-taught. While working together, the first starts talking about observer or singleton patterns, which the 2nd has never heard of but has coded something 90% of the way there on intuition. There could be some friction as they establish a common language. (Yes, this is based on experience, with myself more or less on both sides of the exchange at one point or another).

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nineteen999 119 days ago
Going to assume you mean Miles Davis and not Buddy Miles here! Correct me if I'm wrong.

Yeah that's a good insight.

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