Miles Davis's 'Kind of Blue' Was a 'Failure' by His Own Standards

Miles Davis's 1959 album 'Kind of Blue' is the best-selling jazz record of all time, yet Davis himself considered it a failure. Inspired by the finger piano of Les Ballet Africaines, Ravel's Concerto for the Left Hand, and gospel music from his Arkansas childhood, Davis aimed to capture the sound of an African finger piano. He employed a modal approach, using diatonic scales instead of bebop's chord progressions. All recordings were first takes. In his 1989 autobiography, Davis wrote that he 'missed getting the exact sound of the African finger piano' on tracks like 'All Blues' and 'So What.' Despite its commercial and critical success, Davis felt he fell short of his vision. By 1964, he had formed a new group and moved toward avant-garde acoustic jazz, eventually releasing the electric 'Bitches Brew' in 1969.