Black Comedy

Wayne Shorter (tenor sax), Miles Davis (trumpet), Herbie Hancock (piano), Ron Carter (bass) and Tony Williams (drums). From the album Miles in the Sky (1968).

When Ron Carter finished his studies in 1959 he worked with Thelonious Monk, Chico Hamilton and Cannonball Adderley, and recorded with Eric Dolphy, Don Ellis and Randy Weston, among others. This made him an expert technician, a versatile section partner and a solid soloist, which led to Davis recruiting him in 1963. Tony Williams began his musical career at the age of 13 playing with Sam Rivers and three years later with Jackie McLean, with whom he went to New York. At the age of 17 he became a member of Davis’s group and made up for his lack of professional experience with great energy, passion and creativity.

He was exceptionally talented and eventually became a virtuoso of the instrument and a natural explorer who experimented with everything that inspired his musical interests. Together with Hancock and Carter he embarked on a complex polyrhythmic dialogue. This was a music of moderate expression and insinuations; a path hidden in the brush instead of a highway. However, Williams pushed the band forward with a solid and inspired rhythm when the sound was more open.

The theme is lively and short, with Shorter and Davis playing in unison. Immediately Davis begins to play unstoppable and strongly at a dizzying speed with Williams pushing him with vitality, although occasionally he slows down. Shorter follows him with an equally impetuous solo, though introducing silences between the phrases and juggling, while Hancock encourages him in a stimulating way below. Next comes Hancock with an intrepid and meteoric melodic line hitting the keys hard and the composition ends with Shorter and Davis playing a phrase twice.