Seven Steps to Heaven

Seven Steps to Heaven is the eighth studio album by jazz musician Miles Davis, released in 1963 by Columbia Records, catalogue CL 2051 and CS 8851 in stereo. Recorded at Columbia's 30th Street Studios in Manhattan, and at Columbia Studios in Los Angeles, it presents the Miles Davis Quintet in transition.

Background

After the unfinished sessions for Quiet Nights in 1962, Davis returned to club work. However, he underwent a series of health problems in 1962, which made his live dates inconsistent, missing gigs and incurring financial repercussions.^[4][5] Faced with diminishing returns, by late 1962 his entire band quit, Hank Mobley to a solo career, and the rhythm section of Wynton Kelly, Paul Chambers, and Jimmy Cobb to work as a unit.^[6] The departure of Chambers especially was a blow, as he had been the only man still left from the original formation of the quintet in 1955, the only one never replaced.

With club dates to fulfill, Davis hired several musicians to fill in: Frank Strozier on alto saxophone and Harold Mabern on piano, with George Coleman and Ron Carter arriving early in the year.^[7] For shows on the West Coast in March, Davis added drummer Frank Butler,^[8] but when it came time for the sessions, Davis jettisoned Strozier and Mabern in favor of pianist Victor Feldman.^[9] With a lucrative career as a session musician, Feldman declined Davis' offer to join the group, and both he and Butler were left behind in California.^[10] Back in New York, Davis located the musicians who would be with him for the next six years, Herbie Hancock and Tony Williams; with Carter and Coleman, the new Miles Davis Quintet was in place.^[11] Williams, then only 17 years old, had been working with Jackie McLean, and Hancock had already scored a hit single with "Watermelon Man," done by percussionist Mongo Santamaria.^[12]

Music

The assembled group at the April recording sessions finished enough material for an entire album, but Davis decided the uptempo numbers were not acceptable, and redid all of them with the new group at the May sessions in New York.^[13] Two of the ballad tunes recorded in Los Angeles were ancient, "Baby Won't You Please Come Home" written in 1919 and a hit for Bessie Smith in 1923, while "Basin Street Blues" had been introduced by Louis Armstrong in 1928.^[14] None feature Coleman; all are quartet performances with Davis and the rhythm section.

The uptempo numbers from New York in May include Feldman's "Joshua," which would stay in the Davis performance book for the rest of the decade. This is the last of Davis's studio albums with pop standards rather than band originals; such would be gone by the time the quintet made its last change, replacing Coleman with Wayne Shorter in late 1964.

On March 15, 2005, Legacy Records reissued the album for compact disc with two bonus tracks, both from the Los Angeles sessions in April. "Summer Night" had been previously released on Quiet Nights to bring that album up to an acceptable running time.

Track listing

Side one

Side two

2005 reissue bonus tracks

Personnel

• Miles Davis — trumpet
• George Coleman — tenor saxophone on "Seven Steps to Heaven," "So Near So Far," "Joshua"
• Victor Feldman — piano on "Basin Street Blues," "I Fall in Love Too Easily," "Baby Won't You Please Come Home," "So Near So Far," (alternate), "Summer Night"
• Herbie Hancock — piano on "Seven Steps to Heaven," "So Near So Far," (master), "Joshua"
• Ron Carter — bass
• Frank Butler — drums on "Basin Street Blues," "I Fall in Love Too Easily," "Baby Won't You Please Come Home," "So Near So Far," (alternate), "Summer Night"
• Tony Williams — drums on "Seven Steps to Heaven," "So Near So Far," (master), "Joshua"

References