And Modern Jazz Giants

Full title: Miles Davis And The Modern Jazz Giants.
Personnel: Miles Davis (trumpet); John Coltrane (tenor saxophone); Milt Jackson (vibraphone); Red Garland, Thelonious Monk (piano); Paul Chambers, Percy Heath (bass); Philly Joe Jones, Kenny Clarke (drums).
Recorded at the Van Gelder Studio, Hackensack, New Jersey on December 24, 1954 and October 26, 1956. Originally released on Prestige (7150). Includes liner notes by Ira Gitler.
Digitally remastered using 20-bit technology by Shigeo Miyamoto (JVC Studios).
This is part of the Prestige Records 50th Anniversary Commemorative Special Edition series.
MILES DAVIS AND THE MODERN JAZZ GIANTS features music from the legendary Christmas Eve, 1954 session (minus two takes of "Bags' Groove") featuring Miles, Monk and Milt Jackson, with the Kenny Clarke/Percy Heath rhythm section. Essentially, this is The Modern Jazz Quartet, with Monk on piano and Miles as featured horn.
To flesh out this album, Prestige added one cut from the final marathon sessions Miles made for Prestige to fulfill his contractual obligations after he signed on with Columbia Records in 1955. This October 26, 1956 version of "Round Midnight," coming a year after the Columbia version, finds Miles in a more introspective mood, while Coltrane's solo has an edgy, searching quality.
On the Christmas Eve date, Miles asked Monk to lay out and not comp behind his solos, leading to a priceless moment on the second take of Gershwin's "The Man I Love." A muted Miles begins at a dirge-like tempo, as Jackson and Monk toll away; a tempo change keys a hard swinging Jackson solo--transforming the ballad into a hard blues--and Monk follows like a disembodied ghoul, seemingly enunciating the...man...I...love in hilarious rhythmic paraphrases and long, long rests--disappearing completely just before the bridge as Clarke and Heath burn along valiantly. Finally Miles paraphrases the theme from "Four" by way of saying "Earth to Monk," and the pianist comes charging back with crushing blues chords--one of the great moments in recorded jazz. Elsewhere there's a magnificent "Bemsha Swing" and a driving "Swing Spring," a modal line which anticipates Miles' KIND OF BLUE period, inspiring one of Miles' greatest solos, full of Monk-like motifs and pauses...and Monk's witty rejoinders to his former student.