He's a touchstone in jazz conversation, a cornerstone in jazz collections, and this 1954 gemstone is just one dazzling example of his genius. If you're new to Miles Davis, welcome to a better world. If, on the other hand, you're well versed in his work you may well chorus that singing his praises is about as daring as claiming the Beatles were a nifty combo. Well, quite. But that's no reason not to riff on this beautiful noise.
There are many Miles one can travel from bebop through to fusion, but I tend to live in the lands of hard bop and modal, and kick back in the serenity of his ballads. This particular ballad, penned by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart, has become a dear old friend. Since its debut in the 1940 musical Higher and Higher it has been covered by one or two silken voices, but surely none has lent the lyrics such majestic regret as Frank Sinatra on arguably the finest album of 20th-century song, 1955's In the Wee Small Hours. Yet for emotional punch even Sinatra couldn't trump that trumpet, with Miles backed by Horace Silver at the piano, Percy Heath on bass and Art Blakey's whispered beat in a Hackensack studio on 6 March 1954.
No need for lyrics here, the language is universal, as every intended feeling is conveyed without reaching for a single word: listen, say, for the horn's plaintive cracks and hear a heart in fracture. It's a stunning piece, and one not to be trifled with. What won't do, for instance, is for some romcom-pedia type to mention they've heard it at the end of Runaway Bride, as Julia Roberts proposes to Richard Gere. Call that a spoiler? I call it the heart of darkness: my Miles, my dear Miles, betrayed mid-tune by an apocalypse of Hollywood strings. Ugh, the horror.
