Search - Miles Davis :: Cookin' With the Miles Davis Quintet

Cookin'

Bomojaz | South Central PA, USA | 10/17/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"In 1955, Miles decided to leave Prestige for the larger and better known Columbia recording company, but he still owed Prestige 4 albums in order to fulfill his contract terms. So on May 11, 1956, and again on Oct. 26, 1956, he and his quintet, which included John Coltrane, went into the Van Gelder studios and layed down a long string of titles which went into the 4 albums; these albums were COOKIN', RELAXIN', WORKIN', and STEAMIN'. Sides from both sessions were intermixed on each album.



All the sides here are from the Oct. 26 date (in fact, they were the last titles recorded). All the tunes swing pretty hard, except the ballad feature for Miles (Trane sits out), MY FUNNY VALENTINE. BLUES BY FIVE is a good medium-up blues, and Sonny Rollin's AIREGIN is taken at a gallop. By this time the quintet was meshing pretty well, and all the music recorded on these dates is excellent."

COOKIN': short but sweet

J. Holmes | yokohama, japan | 09/25/2005

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Cookin' is a great record. the performances are smooth as silk and the playing is superb. it's not quite as good as Workin'; which is my personal favorite of all these 1956 Miles Davis Quintet albums; but...you can't go wrong with this timeless and enjoyable slice of jazz history."