Where We Live: Jimmy Cobb Still Kind Of Blue

Whether it’s the first time, or the hundredth time you listen to Miles Davis' "Kind of Blue" it’s still mesmerizing.  It’s the sound of an artist’s greatest artistic and commercial achievement happening all at the same time. 

"Kind of Blue" is the best selling jazz record in history, and brings together the distinctive voices of his late 50’s band – John Coltrane, Cannonball Adderly, Bill Evans – in a new kind of setting.  Loosely structured compositions and extended improvisations based on musical modes, rather than standard tunes. 

In a resolution passed last year, celebrating the album's 50th anniversary, the House of Representitives called "Kind of Blue" the “standard masterpiece of jazz for American musicians and audiences”

But for the drummer in the band, Jimmy Cobb – it was a gig.  A good gig, but one of many that year.  In 1959 alone, Cobb played on the breakout record for a young saxophonist named Wayne Shorter, John Coltrane's milestone "Giant Steps" and Miles' complex collaboration with Gil Evans, "Sketches of Spain."  With all this music he was making, Cobb didn’t realize he’d still be talking about this one record more than half a century later.  

Jimmy Cobb’s musical career didn't start with "Kind of Blue," though, and didn't stop there. It's stretched from the beginning of the bebop era, through the music’s many changes.  He’s played behind singers like Billie Holiday and Dinah Washington, with guitarists Wes Montgomery and Kenny Burrell, and developed a special musical relationship with the under-recognized pianist Wynton Kelly. 

Now, Jimmy Cobb is the only surviving member of the "Kind of Blue" band – and he’s still touring with a much younger group, and still "swinging the band" at 81.  We talked to him when he was in Hartford to play in the Porkpie Hat Jazz Series.