13. Miles DavisKind Of Blue
With Miles Davis, I didn’t take too much notice until I read his autobiography [Miles] which I got in the mid to late ’90s and I was so drawn into his story. I had no idea he was so anarchic and that made me want to hear his music, especially So What. Before that I’d always been into swing because of Billie Holiday which has a certain joyfulness to it and while I liked the style of cool jazz, it always seemed to come with a bit of an ‘up themselves’ attitude. I started doing jazz piano lessons, I wasn’t very good, and I tried a rendition of ‘So What’ which really was so what. But anyone who can spend time with their back to an audience I will admire forever because you must have so much faith in what you play and do, to be able to do that. That’s the epitome of a genius for me.
