My Funny Valentine: Miles Davis in Concert

Miles Davis | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (February 1, 2005)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Sony
• ASIN: B00079I0CE
• Also Available in: Vinyl  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #60,049 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

36 of 43 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Never again. Last best Miles, then a change of heart, February 1, 2005

By 

rash67 (USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: My Funny Valentine: Miles Davis in Concert (Audio CD)

This CD was part of the 2 CD set Miles Davis in Concert 1964, My Funny Valentine & Four and More. This part is broken off. The original CDs interlaced ballads and upbeat tunes as they were performed. Then the ballads were put on one CD and upbeat stuff on another, now (finally) the ballads are released by themselves. And I say "Good for Columbia!" Ordinarily, this would be a poor practice but not in this case.

This concert was months after the Kennedy assasination (JFK). The country was in shock. The Concert was a benefit for the NAACP, CORE and SNCC. The backup band found, when they got there, that they were donating their time. Surprise! They were quite wizzed and it showed, especially in the upbeat stuff, on "Four and More" which is far too up-beat and has a forceful strong angry edge.

The ballads, captured only on this CD are wonderful. Sensitive. Miles poured his soul out through the horn. He had done this before on "Round About Midnight" "Kind of Blue" "Someday My Prince Will Come" etc (see my list) but sadly, he would not do that again.

Miles had a change of mind (or a change of heart) after '64. He played and composed his own music and continued til his death in '91. But he never really exposed the depth of his feelings like this again. And he fled from playing standards with that harmon mute.

(Yeah, Late CD's "Aura" and bit of "Tutu" are good, and other bits here and there, but he never sounded like this again.)

All cuts are good. "All Blues" is far too fast, but not angry. The much maligned George Coleman, like Hank Mobley, has a fine lyric tone (less ascerbic than Coltrane).

Brooding title cut is rumoured to be dedicated to Kennedy. CD label says "incandescent beauty and romance". Yes.

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Half of the Philharmonic show., November 3, 2005

By 

Michael Stack (North Chelmsford, MA USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: My Funny Valentine: Miles Davis in Concert (Audio CD)

On February 12, 1964, Miles Davis took his band (then George Coleman- tenor sax, Herbie Hancock- piano, Ron Carter- bass, and Tony Williams- drums) to perform at New York's Philharmonic Hall, recording the show for release. Not one but two albums were yielded from this recording, "Four and More" and "My Funny Valentine". By this point, this group was a well honed unit, and their work together on these two albums is fantastic.

"My Funny Valentine" by and large collects together the ballads that were performed-- Davis was a remarkably lyrical trumpet player, and in his young rhythm section Davis had a group that could inspire and push him-- his playing had rarely in the past been as adventerous, with his solos finding him reaching, both in terms of ideas and his horn's register. In Coleman, Davis had an odd foil who could match his romanticism. The best performances show off how well this group worked together in framing Davis and Coleman's lyricism-- the title track finds the leader lush and inventive with Carter countering in the upper register before Coleman manages to out-Miles Miles. "All Blues" gets an excited presentation (no doubt due to Tony Williams' explosiveness), and "I Thought About You" features Davis at his most speechlike, enunciating through the horn before turning over to a soulful solo from Coleman and a lovely touch from Hancock.

All in all, this is quite a good show albeit not quite a flawless performance-- Davis seemed pretty uninterested in the theme on "All of You" and I don't really care for this reading of "Stella By Starlight" (although Hancock is fascinating behind the soloists). Noentheless, fans of Davis' lyrical playing wil want to check this out. Recommended.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars There should be more stars for music like this, February 24, 2005

By 

Roy "Roy" (Chicago, IL) - See all my reviews

This review is from: My Funny Valentine: Miles Davis in Concert (Audio CD)

This is pure, absolute instrumental poetry. The title cut is a definitive answer to the question 'what's so great about Jazz?', in that it is one of those amazing spikes on the curve of sonic/emotional ambience that occurs all too rarely. George Coleman does not just make an enjoyable accompanist, he delivers a course on cool jazz saxaphone for the uninitiated. This album is art of a level that is rarely reached by individuals, and here we have a group reaching it together. Of course, the group was composed of giants, but this performance was one of those synergy things, in which the whole was greater than the sum of its parts - This album is an absolute must in any music collection, even if only for the cool jazz mood, which, to paraphrase Eric Dolphy, is gone, in the air, like a bird - it can never be captured again -