Filles de Kilimanjaro

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Filles de Kilimanjaro
Filles de Kilimanjaro cover
Studio album by Miles Davis
Released 1968
Recorded Jun 19, 1968-Sep 24, 1968
Genre Jazz
Length 56:17
Label Columbia
Producer(s)  ?
Professional reviews
Miles Davis chronology
Miles in the Sky
(1968)
Filles de Kilimanjaro
(1968)
In a Silent Way
(1969)


Filles de Kilimanjaro ("Girls of Kilimanjaro") was a 1968 album by Miles Davis, which featured extensive use of looser rhythms and an electric piano. It was recorded in June and September 1968. The June sessions featured Wayne Shorter on saxophone, Herbie Hancock on the Rhodes electric piano, Ron Carter on electric bass, and Tony Williams on drums. The September sessions replaced Hancock with Chick Corea, and Carter with Dave Holland. On the September sessions, Holland played acoustic bass; though Corea plays an electric piano, it is not a Rhodes. These are Holland and Corea's first known recordings with Davis. The album was produced by Teo Macero and engineered by Frank Laico.

The album can be seen as a transitional work between Davis's mainly acoustic recordings with the Second Quintet and his later electric period (for example, Bitches Brew).

"Mademoiselle Mabry" uses a direct quote from Jimi Hendrix's "The Wind Cries Mary", that of the bass walking up three half-steps. It is said that this was a direct response to Hendrix's song, and was in reference to Davis's wife having left him for Hendrix. This is presumably a reference to Betty O. Mabry Davis, who had married Davis in 1968 but divorced him in 1969.

[edit] Track listing

  1. "Frelon Brun" (Brown Hornet) – 5:39
  2. "Tout de Suite" – 14:07
  3. "Petits Machins" (Little Stuff) – 8:07
  4. "Filles de Kilimanjaro" – 12:03
  5. "Mademoiselle Mabry" (Miss Mabry) – 16:32

The first and last tracks were recorded in September 1968, the others in June. The CD reissue includes an alternate take of "Tout De Suite".