I got to the record date a half hour early. I was really anxious, not only because it was my most important involvement with jazz to date—a virtual nobody, suddenly working with some of the finest jazz talents in the world—but also because, as a very experienced musician in classical preparation procedures (rarely exercised in jazz in those days), I worried about how we would be able to record so much new and difficult music in a three-hour record session. And so were J.J. [Johnson] and Bill Barber. We were especially worried about how we were going to get through the Coda in Moon Dreams.
Well, for whatever reason, my request, my suggestion was ignored.
Darn That Dream is a good song, in fact one of Jimmy Van Heusen's best, and it was the easiest piece to record. But in the context of an essentially instrumental ensemble session, it seemed to me that this one vocal piece was odd man out, so to speak, maybe even expendable, and it certainly didn't warrant making more than two takes.
I told Miles that's what we should do, to which, thank God, he readily agreed. I moved my chair and stand forward a foot or two, and told everyone to also move a little so that they could see me. (So far the six 'horns' had all sat in a straight row, with virtually no eye contact between us.)
JazzWax pages: You'll find Gunther Schuller: A Life in
JazzWax clip: Here's Moon Dreams from the March 9, 1950 recording session by the Miles Davis Nonet, featuring Gunther Schuller on French horn...
This story appears courtesy of JazzWax by Marc Myers.
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