The History of Jazz

by Ted Gioia

By the time of Filles de Kilimanjaro, recorded during June and September 1968, the multilayered textures of the earlier quintet releases were increasingly replaced by more insistent ground rhythms. With In a Silent Way from the following February, the change was all but complete. The band’s sound now tended toward uncomplicated patterns reminiscent of the dance and soul music of the day. The harmonies were often static. To cement this change, Davis was enlisting the skills of a wider range of musicians, including keyboardists Joe Zawinul and Chick Corea, guitarist John McLaughlin, and bassist Dave Holland. Within a few months, the last fading elements of the mid-1960s band were purged in favor of the more overtly rock-oriented approach celebrated in Bitches Brew. This release, lamented by many of Davis’s older fans, would attract a younger audience to his music and earn the trumpeter the first gold record of his career.