Gill Evans thought of himself as a man who came to this world to harmonize sounds. He is one of the most influential jazz musicians ever, managing to be at the forefront of two crucial styles in jazz: cool jazz and the Third Stream of jazz music. Evans was the key figure in the birth and development of both genres: cool jazz was born in his basement apartment behind a New York City Chinese laundry, and his arrangements for Miles Davis on “Miles Ahead,” “Sketches of Spain,” and “Porgy and Bess” are among the first and highest ranked alums in the Third Steam style. Gil was known as one of the nicest persons in the jazz world. His personality reflected his musical vision: subtle, gentle, and detailed. It also proved instrumental in getting and keeping together a big number of musicians, along with their egos, in order to create beautiful music such as “The Birth of the Cool.”
Gil Evans was born in Toronto, Canada, but his family soon moved to California where he spent most of his youth. After 1946, he lived and worked primarily in New York City. His first serious job was working as an arranger for the Claude Thornhill Orchestra, where he immediately became “famous” among musicians for his arrangements. Thornhill’s bassist Bill Crow recalled that bandleader Thornhill would bring out Evans’s arrangements “when he wanted to punish the band.” Of course, that was a remark on the complexity of Evans’ arrangements, not their quality, which was ahead of the day. After moving the New York scene out of be-bop and into cool jazz at the end of the forties and the beginning of the fifties, Gil established himself as one of the greatest arrangers in American music. His albums with Miles Davis are one of the classics of modern 20th-century music, but besides those, Evans contributed behind the scenes to Davis' classic quintet albums of the 1960s, which left their mark on contemporary music as well.
From 1957 onwards Evans recorded albums under his name. He was explicitly influenced by Spanish composers Manuel de Falla and Joaquín Rodrigo, and by other Latin and Brazilian music, as well as by German expatriate Kurt Weill. His arrangements (many already well known to some listeners from their original cabaret, concert hall or Broadway stage arrangements) revealed aspects of the music in a wholly original way, sometimes in an unexpected contrast to the original atmosphere of the piece, and sometimes taking a dark ballad such as Weill's "Barbara Song" into an even darker place. At the end of the sixties, he got interested in the new popular trends, especially in the music of Jimi Hendrix. He was so amazed by Hendrix, that during a time, he switched to an electric rhythm section for his big band, and covered the songs of Jimi extensively. During the seventies, he collaborated with many jazz legends and young artists. He started touring extensively outside and in the US. In April 1983, the Gil Evans Orchestra was booked into the Sweet Basil Jazz Club (Greenwich Village, New York) by jazz producer and Sweet Basil owner Horst Liepolt. It turned out to be a regular Monday night engagement for Evans for nearly five years and also resulted in the release of several successful albums by Gil Evans and the Monday Night Orchestra.
The documentary you’re watching in the background is a wonderful 54-minute story of his life, legacy and musical style. Enjoy!
