"Gil Evans" has been added to your list of bookmarked artists
close
Gil Evans
Biography
One of the most significant arrangers in jazz history, Gil Evans' three album-length collaborations with Miles Davis (Miles Ahead, Porgy and Bess and Sketches of Spain) are all considered classics. Evans had a lengthy and wide-ranging career that sometimes ran parallel to the trumpeter. Like Davis, Gil became involved in utilizing electronics in the 1970s and preferred not to look back and recreate the past. He led his own band in California (1933-38) which eventually became the backup group for Skinnay Ennis; Evans stayed on for a time as arranger. He gained recognition for his somewhat futuristic charts for Claude Thornhill's Orchestra (1941-42 and 1946-48) which took advantage of the ensemble's cool tones, utilized French horns and a tuba as frontline instruments and by 1946 incorporated the influence of bop. He met Miles Davis (who admired his work with Thornhill) during this time and contributed arrangements of "Moon Dreams" and "Boplicity" to Davis' "Birth of the Cool" nonet.

After a period in obscurity, Evans wrote for a Helen Merrill session and then collaborated with Davis on Miles Ahead. In addition to his work with Miles (which also included a 1961 recorded Carnegie Hall concert and the half-album Quiet Nights), Evans recorded several superb and highly original sets as a leader (including Gil Evans and Ten, New Bottle Old Wine and Great Jazz Standards) during the era.