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In his lucidly written account of the making and legacy of a particularrecording session, British music critic Richard Williams argues that Kind of Blue is one of the lastcentury’s most influential albums. The 1959 Miles Davis LP is perhaps the mostpopular jazz album ever; the author observes that it’s the sole jazz record inmany collections. Moreover, as a distillation of the cool aesthetic Davishelped define throughout the ’50s, Kindof Blue further opened the way to developments in music undreamed of in1959, influencing the minimalism of Steve Reich and Philip Glass; the ambientmusic of Brian Eno and Eno’s productions for David Bowie and U2; and a host ofunlikely rock musicians, including Duane Allman and Andy Summers. In combining“complexity of content with a powerful sense of ambience,” Kind of Blue showed how a sense of space, “a mood of calmcontemplation,” can live within the heart of music.
