Miles Davis Biopic & Albums Coming Soon

With the New York Film Festival 2015 and the Sundance Film Festival 2016 in the rearview mirror, Miles Ahead – written by Steven Baigelman and Don Cheadle – will get a pair of screenings at the South by Southwest music festival this week.  Don, along with Robert Glasper will be there speaking about it as well.

The film, one that Cheadle learned to play trumpet for as well as his directorial debut, is not a standard birth to death biopic.   It focuses on a pivotal point in the life of the genius musician who grew up in East St. Louis and moved to New York in 1944.  The past is illuminated through flashbacks.  Cheadle has been quoted as referring to the narrative as modal.

Robert Glasper composed music for the film and scored its soundtrack.  A handful of tracks that Glasper wrote, co-wrote, produced and/or performed appear on the soundtrack along with eleven choice Davis tracks.  The project led to a whole other album as well in which Glasper interprets Davis’ music along with a mob of talented artists eager to paint their own musical colors on a Miles canvas.  Everything’s Beautiful features Bilal, Illa J, Erykah Badu, Phonte, Hiatus Kaiyote, Laura Mvula, KING, Georgia Ann Muldrow, John Scofield and Ledisi, and Stevie Wonder.  The film is in the now as much as that forthcoming album.  The closing concert sequence boasts Gary Clark Jr and Esperanza Spaulding along with Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter aside Cheadle’s Davis.

The flick and soundtrack will be out a week from Friday (4/1) while Everything’s Beautiful will be released on May 27th which is the day after what would have been Miles’ 90th birthday.

As part of the Winter Jazzfest (all over town and now in its 11th year) Robert Glasper played a gig at Le Poisson Rouge in the west village with Vicente Archer on bass and Damion Reid on drums. Those guys go way back including the Grammy winning artist‘s first couple of albums on Blue Note: Canvas and In My Element.  The trio played selections from Glasper’s upcoming new album.  Glasper has written the score for the highly anticipated forthcoming Miles Davis biopic Miles Ahead.