Jazz Professor remembers Miles Davis

*personal photo

Under rows of warm caramel colored chandeliers and portraits of DePaul University’s past Presidents, the audience of nearly eighty North-faced jackets and suits in the Courtelyou Commons, stare curiously back at a slide-show picture of Miles Davis.  Standing on the podium next to the screen is Dr. John Szwed, author of the 2002 biography “Miles Davis:  The Jazz Musician as Dandy” and Acting Director of the Center for Jazz Studies at Columbia University, who turns his head to the left and informs the audience the picture is a typical shot of Mr. Davis.  During a time when most jazz album covers hardly showed a face to the instrument player, Davis sits casually slumped in his chair while holding his trumpet rockingly over his thigh, staring fearlessly back at the person holding the album, “Milestones….Miles Davis”.

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He was a man who knew how to “break the rules”, says Szwed smiling as he went on to show many more pictures and videos of Davis’ misinterpreted behavior.  From quirky note changes on familiar songs, to literally “turning his back” on the audience, Szwed commended Davis not only as the “Prince of Darkness” but an eccentric, lonely, and one of the most misunderstood artists of all time.

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“Has anyone seen the movie, ‘On the Waterfront’?” asks Szwed to the audience of mostly early to late 20’s with just a sprinkle of head nods smiling back at him.  He goes on explain his favorite “cool” scene in the movie of Marlon Brando putting on one of actress Eva Marie Saint’s gloves’ after she accidentally drops it on the ground while remaining in character, reminding him of Davis’ demeanor on stage.  “What person could do that and get away with it?  No one.” said Szwed.  Davis constantly refused to assimilate to, predominantly white, audience’s expectations of his performance on stage, purposefully to “treat whites how they treated blacks in servitude positions”.  Sporting his double-breasted silk lined suits and “clean as a freakin whitsle” shoes, Davis, said Szwed, let it be known to everyone watching that he will never “disappear into white society”.

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“I think Dr. Szwed is doing some of the most important, accessible, elegant, and sophisticated work in the field today,” says Professor Jonathan Gross, DePaul University’s Humanities Center Director, who was inspired to invite Szwed because of his “creativity in narratives.”  “I prefer his work to others who write on music because I find it more objective, scientific, and informed.”

Last month marked the 20^th anniversary of Miles Davis’ death, which, even to this day, his legend still lingers on fictional stories that Szwed emphasizes, if any are true, were done purposefully.  A trick that many artists today, such as Lady Gaga’s recent eye-brow raising performance for President Bill Clinton’s 65^th birthday, only hope to gain publicity that’s as highly practiced and emulated.  But because he remained reserved about his past and didn’t care to acknowledge the celebritism of his own creation, blanks were open enough to be filled with such sensational rumors.

“As a classically trained artist, Davis wanted to present jazz music the way the art form was supposed to be done, with respect.”  Said Szwed as he pointed to a video shot of Davis standing motionless while playing his trumpet.  A perfect portrait of a man who just wanted to play music, never caring to notice the obsessive eyes glaring back at him of those who yearned for more despite his “artistic temperament”.