Work with Miles Davis, Everybody Digs Bill Evans, and Kind of Blue
In February 1958, at Miles Davis's urging, Russell drove Evans to the Colony Club in Brooklyn to play with Davis's sextet. At this time, John Coltrane, Cannonball Adderley, Paul Chambers, and Philly Joe Jones were the other members of Davis's group. Red Garland had recently been fired, and Evans knew he was not merely filling in for one night but auditioning to become the group's regular pianist. By the end of the night, Davis told Evans that he would play their next engagement in Philadelphia. The band had been known for playing a mixture of jazz standards and bebop originals, but by the time Evans arrived, Davis had begun his venture into modal jazz, having just released his album Milestones.
Evans formally joined Davis's group in April 1958. The band appeared in radio broadcasts on Saturday nights and, on May 3, the new formation made its first broadcast from Café Bohemia (its usual locale). The live radio appearance broadcast on May 17, 1958, and also released on the album titled Makin' Wax, is the earliest documented evidence of collaboration between Evans and Davis. By mid-May, Jimmy Cobb replaced Philly Joe Jones, with whom Evans had developed a close friendship. On May 26, Evans made his first studio recordings with Davis, which were first issued as part of Jazz Track, and later reissued on 1958 Miles.
A performance of the Ballets Africains from Guinea in 1958 sparked Davis's interest in modal music. This music stayed for long periods of time on a single chord, weaving in and out of consonance and dissonance. Another influence was George Russell's treatise. Both influences coalesced in Davis's conception of modal jazz offering an alternative to chord changes and major/minor key relationships, relying instead on a series of modal scales. He realized that Evans, who had worked with Russell, could follow him into modal music. At the same time, Evans introduced Davis to 20th-century classical composers such as Sergei Rachmaninoff, Maurice Ravel, and Aram Khachaturian.
The band's mostly black followers did not react favorably to the replacement of Garland with a white musician. Davis used to tease him, and Evans's sensitivity perhaps let it get to him. But the band began to find a new, smoother groove, as Adderley recalled: "When he started to use Bill, Miles changed his style from very hard to a softer approach."
In July 1958, Evans appeared as a sideman on Adderley's album Portrait of Cannonball, featuring the first performance of "Nardis", specially written by Davis for the session. While Davis was not very satisfied with the performance, he said that from then on, Evans was the only one to play it in the way he wanted. The piece came to be associated with Evans's future trios, which played it frequently.
By the end of the summer, Davis knew Evans was quickly approaching his full professional development and that he would soon leave Davis's group. That year, Evans won the DownBeat International Critics' Poll for his work with Davis and his album New Jazz Conceptions.
In September 1958, Evans recorded as a sideman in Art Farmer's album Modern Art, also featuring Benny Golson. All three had won the DownBeat poll. Later, Evans deemed this record one of his favorites. During this period, despite all the successes, Evans was visiting a psychiatrist, as he was unsure whether he wanted to continue as a pianist.
Evans left Davis's sextet in November 1958 and stayed with his parents in Florida and his brother in Louisiana. While he was burned out, one of the main reasons for leaving was his father's illness. During this sojourn, the always self-critical Evans suddenly felt his playing had improved. "While I was staying with my brother in Baton Rouge, I remember finding that somehow I had reached a new level of expression in my playing. It had come almost automatically, and I was very anxious about it, afraid I might lose it."
Shortly after, he moved back to New York, and in December Evans recorded the trio album Everybody Digs Bill Evans for Riverside Records with bassist Sam Jones and drummer Philly Joe Jones. This was Evans's second album as a leader, the first since New Jazz Conceptions, recorded two years earlier. While Keepnews had often tried to persuade Evans to make a second trio recording, the pianist felt he had nothing new to say until then. He had also been too busy traveling with Davis to make a record.
One of the pieces to appear on the album was Leonard Bernstein's "Some Other Time". Evans started to play an introduction using an ostinato figure. But, according to Keepnews, who was present, Evans spontaneously started to improvise over that harmonic frame, creating the recording that would be named "Peace Piece". According to Evans: "What happened was that I started to play the introduction, and it started to get so much of its own feeling and identity that I just figured, well, I'll keep going." But Gretchen Magee has said the piece was penned as an exercise during Evans's college years, and Peri Cousins says that Evans often played the piece at home.
Evans returned to the Davis sextet in early 1959, at the trumpeter's request, to record Kind of Blue, often considered the best-selling jazz album of all time.
As usual, during the sessions of Kind of Blue, Davis called for almost no rehearsal and the musicians had little idea what they were to record. Davis had given the band only sketches of scales and melody lines on which to improvise. Once the musicians were assembled, Davis gave brief instructions for each piece and then set about taping the sextet in studio.
During the creative process of Kind of Blue, Davis handed Evans a piece of paper with two chords—G minor and A augmented—and asked "What would you do with that?" Evans spent the next night writing what became "Blue in Green". But when the album came out, the song was attributed exclusively to Davis. When Evans suggested he deserved a share of the royalties, Davis offered him a check for $25. Evans also wrote the liner notes for Kind of Blue, comparing jazz improvisation to Japanese visual art. By the fall of 1959, Evans had started his own trio with Jimmy Garrison and Kenny Dennis, but it was short-lived.
Sometime during the late 1950s, most probably before joining Davis, Evans began using heroin. Philly Joe Jones has been cited as an especially bad influence in this regard. Davis seems to have tried to help Evans kick his addiction, but failed.
Evans's first long-term romance was with a black woman named Peri Cousins (for whom "Peri's Scope" was named), during the second half of the 1950s. The couple had problems booking hotels during Evans's gigs, since most did not allow interracial couples. By the turn of the decade, Evans had met a waitress named Ellaine Schultz, who became his partner for 12 years.
