Miles Davis: "Nardis," Part 2 of 3

In the previous post, I gave you some of the evidence that Miles Davis wrote “Nardis,” for a Cannonball Adderley recording session in 1958. But because there is a persistent rumor that Bill Evans wrote it, I promised you that I would go through all of the arguments that people use to support that idea. At the bottom of this essay, I will present yet more evidence that Miles wrote it.

OK, here we go:

—It is claimed that Miles was not much of a composer—that he only wrote a few simple little tunes like “All Blues” and “Freddie Freeloader”—and that he didn’t have the compositional ability to have written “Nardis.” Those who propose this argument are ignorant of what Davis actually wrote. It is true that he didn’t write much. Even Keepnews wrote in his notes, quoted in the previous post, that this was one of his “rather infrequent compositions.” Not all players are also composers. That was especially true in the pre-bop era—such greats as Lester Young and Louis Armstrong only wrote a few tunes each.

But here are some other tunes that Miles wrote: “Sippin’ at Bells,” “Little Willie Leaps,” “Agitation,” “Circle in the Round,” “Bitches Brew.” Just from this small and incomplete list, you can see (and hear, if you listen to these online) that when he did compose, he produced pieces that are unusual, original, and in a wild variety of styles. It’s impossible to hear “Bitches Brew” and say “Oh, that must have been written by the same person who composed ‘Sippin’ at Bells.’” They are from two different worlds. So it is not possible to generalize about what kinds of tunes Miles wrote—except that it is completely false that he only wrote simple little tunes.

Therefore, it is absolutely believable that he wrote “Nardis” —even more so, because it employs scales that are unusual for jazz, and 1958 was precisely the period when Miles was getting away from the usual major and minor scales. He told Nat Hentoff, for an article published that December, about his interest in using fewer chords and exploring scales. He specifically mentioned non-Western scales such as those found in the music of classical composer Khachaturian, and scales that were being taught by jazz composer George Russell (“An Afternoon with Miles Davis,” Nat Hentoff, The Jazz Review, December 1958).

The A section of this AABA tune uses both the E Phrygian scale, and another scale found under various names. Saxophonist-composer Allan Chase of Berklee College of Music shared with me that “the A section of "Nardis" is highly chromatic, but the melody emphasizes the so-called ‘Spanish Phrygian’ scale sound of E and F triads combined—E F G# A B C (and D# or D). This is a scale or set of related scales with many names (Hijaz, "gypsy," double harmonic, Raag Bhairav, etc.) related to Arabic and Indian music as well as flamenco and Spanish music.” In fact it was partly Davis’s, and Gil Evans’s, interest in this kind of material that led to them creating the album Sketches of Spain a year later.

Harmonica virtuoso and pianist Howard Levy recently pointed out to me that it’s even possible that Miles was inspired by the song “Misirlou.” This is such an interesting point that I’ve decided to add a third part to this post about that.

—Some say it’s suspicious that Miles could not explain what the title meant or where it came from. On January 30, 1986, pianist, songwriter, author Ben Sidran surprised Miles at the end of an interview by telling him that “Sidran” backwards is “Nardis.” Neither one can say where the name “Nardis” came from, although Miles mumbles something that sounds like the word “nuclear”:

But the fact that Miles could not explain the title is not significant. We don’t even know whether Miles is the one who titled it. As we’ll see, it is way more common than most people think for a tune to be titled by someone at the record label. And even if Miles did title it, his memory was famously terrible.

If he is indeed saying the word “nuclear,” the only connection I can find is that two people with the last name Nardi worked in small roles on the Manhattan Project that developed the first atomic bomb. If by chance one of them had met Miles (or whoever named the tune), the original title might have been “Nardi’s.” Leaving aside the possibility that Miles may have said “nuclear,” there was a trumpeter Tony DiNardi who played in 1940s big bands, including Fletcher Henderson’s. He was one of the few white musicians to ever tour with Henderson, and Dexter Gordon joined during his last month with the band, so they knew each other. It’s also possible that whoever named it knew Sidran’s father, and got the idea to use that name backwards. (Ben himself would have been too young—he was born in 1943.) And please keep in mind that both Nardis and Sidran are actual family surnames, even if they are rare.

(It has also been suggested that the title could be an anagram of the last name of composer Earl Zindars, but he was not yet known. Only one Zindars tune—”Mother of Earl”—was played in jazz circles in 1958. And the anagram doesn’t quite work, because of that extra “z.”)

Also, notice that Davis volunteers the information that “I did it for Cannonball.” That is yet one more piece of evidence that he wrote it. Sidran did not lead him on to say that.

—The next argument is that Miles had the bad habit of “stealing” tunes from his friends and sidemen. That is not exactly true, as I have shown in Parts 1 to 3 of this series. But, more important, what does that have to do with this? If your argument is that Bill Evans practically begged Miles to buy his tune, that would be the opposite of Miles claiming credit for a tune that he didn’t write.

—It is claimed that Miles had recorded every other tune that he allegedly wrote, so that it’s very strange that he did not record “Nardis” himself. That is another false argument. It is in fact exceptionally common for artists to compose and even to copyright a few tunes that they never record or perform. In fact, I suggest that you go here and look up any musician at all—there are almost always a few pieces listed that were never recorded. That goes for Wayne Shorter, Keith Jarrett, Louis Armstrong, and others. Besides, in this case, since Miles wrote the tune for Cannonball, that is enough to explain why he didn’t record it himself. Remember, we learned last time that Cannonball made a special request for Miles to write a tune for him. If Miles brought in a tune that he himself would be performing and recording, that would not have been a satisfactory gift.

—It is claimed that “Nardis” is in the Bill Evans style. This argument doesn’t work either, because Evans never wrote anything at all like this. And the last four measures of the bridge sound like something from an earlier era, almost like a Tadd Dameron bridge—that is, something from Davis’s circle of musicians. Besides, one would have to find an Evans piece written before “Nardis,” in order to be sure that it was not influenced by “Nardis.” It is certain that Evans was strongly impacted by playing “Nardis,” and by working with Davis on modal pieces generally. But by mid-’58 he had only recorded four original pieces, including “Waltz for Debby,” on his first album as a leader, New Jazz Conceptions, and none of them bears any relationship to “Nardis.”

And if you insist on looking at later pieces by Evans, although I don’t think it makes sense to do that, people have suggested to me the two-chord vamp that he called “NYC’s No Lark.” But there is nothing about this—or any other Evans piece—that resembles “Nardis.”

Besides, the evidence of style is always shaky and very weak. It’s difficult to analyze a piece on paper, and people will disagree about whether a piece “sounds like” it’s by this person or that person. On a recorded improvisation there can be agreement, because one has, in addition to the notes, the musician’s sound. But looking at a composition on paper will never replace factual evidence, of which we have plenty in this case—all in favor of Miles as the composer.

In order to say that Evans wrote “Nardis,” in the face of so much evidence that Miles wrote it, one would have to find a stylistic "smoking gun"—something that one would only find in an Evans piece. To say that "Evans could have written this" would be an extremely weak argument. One have to be able to say "Only Evans could have written this." I do not see or hear any way to make that case.

—It is claimed that “Nardis” could only have been written by a pianist, based on the style, the key, and the unusual chord progression. As I just explained, one can argue about such things, but it is almost impossible to “prove” anything based on style alone. Besides, Miles was well-known to be very knowledgeable about chords, and often showed voicings and progressions to others. (See this post of mine that has many photos of him showing voicings to his pianists.) And he sometimes used the piano when composing.

—It is claimed that Bill Evans desperately needed money (for drugs perhaps) and that that’s why he sold it to Miles. Of all the arguments, this one makes the least sense, for many reasons:

Miles’s band members were among the best-paid musicians in the jazz world. Over the years, several of them were drug addicts, and none of them was in the habit of “selling tunes” to Miles. Nor was Miles interested in buying their tunes. Besides, when musicians did sell the rights to their tunes, they sold them to a publisher, not to another musician. (See Part 1 of this series again for a detailed explanation of how this worked.) In return, they would have received the usual advance payment, which was only $50. It’s simply foolish to suggest that Miles would have pulled $50 or more out of his pocket and said, “Yes, Bill, I must have that tune that you wrote. I will deliver it to my publisher with my name on it, so that I can get back the $50 I am giving you now.”

What’s more ridiculous is that people imagine that Miles gave Bill a lot of money for this unknown tune, maybe even a few thousand dollars. Why would Miles think that any of Bill’s tunes was worth anything at all? Remember, Bill was not famous yet, he had never written anything that had financial value, and there was no reason to think that “Nardis” would be worth anything.

When they needed extra money, Miles’s musicians asked for an “advance” (advance money to be deducted from any future payments) from the record company, never from Miles. There’s a paper trail on this type of thing. Just to give you an idea, here’s one from Atlantic Records, showing that Elvin Jones received an advance on the day that he recorded on Coltrane’s album Olé:

And let’s remember that Bill was known to be aggressive about getting his proper compositional credits. We will talk in another post about Bill’s outspokenness regarding “Blue in Green.” Yet, you want us to believe that he was willing to give up the rights to “Nardis” for all eternity, for a $50 advance? I’m sorry, but that is a crazy idea.

And, of course, please don’t ever forget that the biggest problem with this theory is that Evans not only said in interviews that the tune was by Miles, but repeated that at performances. How do the rumor-spreaders explain that? Their theory says that Bill was such an honorable person, that after he promised to say that Miles wrote the tune, he honored his commitment for the rest of his life, even going beyond and doing a big introduction, when he typically said nothing or very little before playing a tune. In other words, they say, paraphrasing Shakespeare, “He protests too much.” But once again, that is false. Bill always gave a nice spoken introduction for every tune. For example, if one watches the rest of that video from Helsinki that I excerpted before, you will see that he introduces every tune in the same detailed manner.

And, now that I’ve dismissed all of the arguments against Miles, here are some more proofs that Miles did write it. First, here is the music part that Bill Evans gave to his bass players, and it identifies Miles as the composer (“M.D.” in the upper right)

I emailed Marc Johnson, Evans’s last bassist and still a vital force on the instrument, about this leadsheet. He wrote:

“Miles wrote ‘Nardis.’ This is indeed Bill's notation.  However, it existed already as part of a collection of Bill's handwritten parts for other bassists who must have used 'the book'  before I appeared on the bandstand.  Almost all of the parts contained the basic structure and chordal information and some kind of intro or ending and usually some idea of the arrangement.  In the case of ‘Nardis,’ I see he didn't notate the chords on the ending, only the approximate rhythm he intended. ”

(You can hear that ending performed at the end of the 1979 TV performance in the previous post.)

Now, why would Evans indicate that Davis was the author on a private leadsheet for his musicians, a leadsheet that he never thought anyone else would see, unless it really is by Miles?

Furthermore, Times Remembered, a memoir by Evans’s last drummer, Joe LaBarbera, contains this comment about “Nardis”: "Throughout his career, Bill played this so often and so well that many have assumed he composed it despite his consistent denial of authorship."  In addition, producer Orrin Keepnews suspected that Bill wrote it, but learned otherwise: "I always felt that Bill must have had a hand in writing ‘Nardis,’ which through the years was a permanent part of his trio repertoire, but he insisted it was entirely Miles' work” (the magazine Keyboard, October 1987). Keepnews was an honest person who the musicians knew and trusted, and who was careful to give proper composer credits. It’s hard to believe that Evans would have lied to him—and that, if he lied, he could have fooled Keepnews—especially when Bill was adamant about getting credit when he felt that he deserved it.

In fact, nobody ever heard Evans claim “I wrote ‘Nardis,’ but don’t tell anybody”— not even in private. That includes not only Johnson and LaBarbera, who played it with Bill almost every night for about two years, but also pianist Richie Beirach, who was friends with Bill Evans the last five years of his life (he told me this by email), and Marty Morell, who was Evans’s regular drummer for years, before LaBarbera. (I thank saxophonist-educator Jeff Rupert for asking Morell on my behalf.) Bill never said that he wrote “Nardis,” because he didn’t write it.

So to close, I return to the opening statement of my previous post: When all the evidence points in one direction, it makes no sense to assume that the truth is in the opposite direction. In short:

Miles Davis wrote “Nardis”—end of discussion, case closed.

But let’s look next at “Misirlou,” a possible inspiration for Miles’s song “Nardis.”

All the best,
Lewis