Great Jazz Albums (IMO) #15

Miles Davis, Relaxin' With The Miles Davis Quintet (1956).  I thought it was time for a Miles Davis album.  There is obviously a lot to choose from, but my absolute favorite recordings are those from his first quintet, which consisted of the young John Coltrane on sax, the wonderful Red Garland on piano (more on Red in a later post), Paul Chambers on bass, and Philly Joe Jones on drums.  As the story goes, to satisfy his contract with Prestige before jumping to Columbia, the quintet got together in the studio for two sessions in 1956 and quickly recorded 26 tracks, all first takes.  This yielded three great records:  Relaxin', Steamin' and Cookin'.  I agree with one critic who states "each of these is considered not only to be among the pinnacle of Davis' work, but of the entire bop subgenre as well."  It is hard to pick one, but I'm going with Relaxin', because of the song selection, particularly the opening number "If I Were A Bell."  As the above-quoted critic said, Relaxin' "offers something for every degree of jazz enthusiast."  [Related posts:  Really Great Jazz Albums,  #1, #2, #3, #4, #5, #6, #7, #8, #9, #10, #11, #12, #13, #14]