Walkin'

Walkin'
Compilation album by Miles Davis
Released	March 1957 [1]
Recorded	April 3, 1954 (#3-5) April 29, 1954 (#1-2)
Studio	Van Gelder (Hackensack)
Genre	Jazz, hard bop
Length	37:43
Label	Prestige PRLP 7076
Producer	Bob Weinstock
Miles Davis chronology
'Round About Midnight (1957) Walkin' (1957) Cookin' (1957)

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[2]
The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings	[3]

Walkin' (PRLP 7076) is a Miles Davis compilation album released in March 1957 by Prestige Records. ^[1] The album compiles material previously released on two 10 inch LPs in 1954 (Miles Davis All-Star Sextet and Side One of Miles Davis Quintet, dropping "I'll Remember April" from Side Two (which had been on the 12" LP Blue Haze , released the previous year, itself a collection of tunes from previous 10" LPs) and replacing it with the previously unreleased "Love Me or Leave Me" recorded at the same session. Here credited to the "Miles Davis All-Stars", the songs were recorded on April 3 and 29, 1954, by two slightly different groups led by Davis. Both sessions were recorded at Rudy Van Gelder's home studio.

The earlier session was a quintet with David Schildkraut on alto saxophone, which produced the three tracks on side two. Schildkraut is the only musician not credited on the cover, and is otherwise almost unknown. Two of these tracks were originally released on the 10" LP Miles Davis Quintet , Prestige PRLP 185. The earlier release also included "I'll Remember April", recorded at the same time, now found on the Prestige album Blue Haze (PRLP 7054). ^[4] Another tune from this session, "Love Me or Leave Me", was previously unreleased and substituted here for "I'll Remember April".

The second session, which makes up all of side one, was a sextet with J. J. Johnson on trombone and Lucky Thompson on tenor saxophone. The rhythm section was identical to the earlier session. These two tracks were originally issued on the 10" LP Miles Davis All-Star Sextet PRLP 182. ^[5] The album's title track, a staple of Davis's live set for many years, was key to the emerging hard bop approach developed in the mid-1950s, Davis providing it with an anthem. The composition has been attributed by various sources to Jimmy Mundy, Miles Davis, and Gene Ammons. The copyright registration listed the composer as Richard E. Carpenter, a businessman and artist manager who had professional relationships with Mundy and Tadd Dameron, and was not known to be a musician or composer. ^[6]

"Solar" was attributed to Davis and copyrighted in his name in 1963. ^{[7] [8]} Evidence revealed in 2012 showed that it is nearly identical to "Sonny", a piece written by guitarist Chuck Wayne in the 1940s, so Wayne is regarded as the composer of "Solar". ^{[7] [8]}

Track listing

Side one

No.	Title	Writer(s)	Length
1.	"Walkin' (Gravy)"	Jimmy Mundy, Richard Carpenter	13:26
2.	"Blue 'n' Boogie"	Dizzy Gillespie, Frank Paparelli	8:16

Side two

No.	Title	Writer(s)	Length
1.	"Solar (Sonny)"	Chuck Wayne, Miles Davis	4:44
2.	"You Don't Know What Love Is"	Don Raye, Gene de Paul	4:23
3.	"Love Me or Leave Me"	Gus Kahn, Walter Donaldson	6:54

Personnel

• Miles Davis – trumpet
• Lucky Thompson – tenor saxophone on side one
• J. J. Johnson – trombone on side one
• David Schildkraut – alto saxophone on side two
• Horace Silver – piano
• Percy Heath – bass
• Kenny Clarke – drums

References

1. Editorial Staff, Cash Box (March 9, 1957). "March Album Releases" (PDF). The Cash Box . New York: The Cash Box Publishing Co. Inc. Retrieved March 2, 2020.
2. "Walkin' – Miles Davis All-Stars | AllMusic". allmusic.com. 2011. Retrieved August 2, 2011.
3. Cook, Richard; Morton, Brian (2008). The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings (9th ed.). Penguin. p. 341. ISBN   978-0-141-03401-0.
4. April 3, 1954 Session Details, Miles Ahead: A Miles Davis Website, accessed May 26, 2014
5. April 29, 1954 Session Details, Miles Ahead: A Miles Davis Website, accessed May 22, 2014
6. Gavin, James (2011). Deep in a Dream: The Long Night of Chet Baker. Chicago Review Press. ISBN   978-1569767573.
7. Myers, Marc (July 5, 2012). "'Solar' Wasn't by Miles Davis". jazzwax.com. Archived from the original on May 9, 2016.
8. Meyer, Robinson (June 9, 2010). "The Time Miles Davis Stole (or Borrowed) a Song – and How It Ended Up on His Tombstone". The Atlantic . Retrieved August 3, 2020.