Lee Konitz Featuring Miles Davis stands as the trumpeter’s sole sideman date for Prestige, appearing on tracks 1-4. Again, the echo of Birth of the Cool is prominent. “Ezzthetic,” a George Russell original, is typical of the session, owing much of its subdued feel and harmonic complexity to the influence of pianist Lennie Tristano: Sal Mosca, Billy Bauer and Arnold Fishkin who appear on these recordings were all students of Tristano’s approach, and Konitz a star pupil.
Note Miles’ long notes wafting over the relative ferment of the rhythm section on that tune, and his purposeful, breathy reading of the abstract lines of “Odjenar”—another Russell original—and on the opening, and edge-of-dissonance close of the Jerome Kern standard “Yesterdays.”