I was looking forward to finally completing John Szwed's biography of Miles Davis. His biography of Sun Ra left a major mark on me, pushing me to listen extensively to the Arkestra nearly ten years ago. At the time, I was still lacking a deeper knowledge of the general trajectory of jazz, and reading about Sun Ra led me to challenge myself by exploring other avant-garde and free jazz artists. Szwed's Miles book, however, leaves less of an impression. Perhaps due to being more familiar with Miles and his large impact on jazz for almost half a century, some of the musical commentary or social commentary was less informative. Nevertheless, So What succeeds in relating Miles Davis to his time, introducing the reader to a litany of musical, literary and artistic figures of the 20th century Miles met, influenced, or was in turn shaped by, including Sartre, Cicely Tyson, Gil Evans, and a plethora of others. Szwed knows his discography, providing succinct and useful summary or analysis of various moments in the evolution of Miles as a musician from the 1940s to the 1990s.
Davis's background in Illinois, troubled relationship with drugs, abuse of women, and decaying health are not overlooked, either. In short, Szwed is sympathetic to his subject, but is objective enough to point out some of the failures or shortcomings of Davis's later studio albums of the 1980s. But some of his very shortcomings may also explain his greatness. His shyness is alleged to have caused him to play with his back to the audience, while his lack of strong or clear directions to members of his bands was part of a strategy of letting them stumble and make their own way. Davis's clear contributions to the development of various sub-genres of jazz, from cool to fusion, are explained in an accessible manner. Davis's social meaning, as a black musician perceived as arrogant, is parsed throughout the text. Davis, not unlike Mingus, seems to have relished a certain image of himself and his relationship to the music industry, American race relations embedded in every aspect. Davis could never escape race (despite thinking he could in his early trips to Paris), and suffering at the hands of bigoted cops certainly did not help.
Davis's relationship with Columbia also stands out as highly problematic. Miles was constantly asking for advances and loans from the record company, which profited handsomely from his work while Davis, whose lifestyle and luxurious consumption demanded more funds, had to fight tooth and nail with Columbia for records he wanted. Fortunately, and surprisingly for those who know little about the role of Teo Macero in Miles's music, his recordings with Columbia revolutionized music through innovative use of post-production editing, ambient sounds, and a creative use of electronic instruments for new textures. Like Szwed observes, there is a continuity in Miles, despite his efforts to always look ahead to the next aesthetic movement. For Miles, his muted trumpet, use of space, and willingness to let sidemen express their own individual styles seem consistent across his career. Even in his ailing later years, Miles endeavored to stay fresh, to try new ideas or concepts. He persistently sought to escape the limitations placed upon black musical artists, to escape the narrow confines of jazz as record labels sought to define it. But, like his idol Jack Johnson, he never let you forget he was black, despite his 'cool' style, the influence of Ravel, or his embrace of elements of rock (which was filtered through Hendrix, Sly Stone).
