Overview
Quincy Troupe's candid account of his friendship with Miles Davis is a revealing portrait of a great musician and an intimate study of a unique relationship. It is also an engrossing chronicle of the author's own development, both artistic and personal. As Davis's collaborator on Miles: The Autobiography,Troupe—one of the major poets to emerge from the 1960s—had exceptional access to the musician. This memoir goes beyond the life portrayed in the autobiography to describe in detail the processes of Davis's spectacular creativity and the joys and difficulties his passionate, contradictory temperament posed to the men's friendship. It shows how Miles Davis, both as a black man and an artist, influenced not only Quincy Troupe but whole generations.
Troupe has written that Miles Davis was "irascible, contemptuous, brutally honest, ill-tempered when things didn't go his way, complex, fair-minded, humble, kind and a son-of-a-bitch." The author's love and appreciation for Davis make him a keen, though not uncritical, observer. He captures and conveys the power of the musician's presence, the mesmerizing force of his personality, and the restless energy that lay at the root of his creativity. He also shows Davis's lighter side: cooking, prowling the streets of Manhattan, painting, riding his horse at his Malibu home. Troupe discusses Davis's musical output, situating his albums in the context of the times—both political and musical—out of which they emerged. Miles and Me is an unparalleled look at the act of creation and the forces behind it, at how the innovations of one person can inspire both those he knows and loves and the world at large.
Synopsis
"If there is a genius in music in the 20th century, it's Miles Davis, and no one has gotten more involved in his life and his music than the poet Quincy Troupe."—Barbara Christian, University of California, Berkeley
"Brilliant, poetic, provocative, Quincy Troupe's Miles and Me reveals the man behind the dark glasses and legend."—Ishmael Reed, author of Mumbo Jumbo
Flaunt
Troupe seems to have penetrated the jazz legend's prickly exterior. Miles and Me seduces with hilariously mundane anecdotes.
Editorials
Flaunt
Troupe seems to have penetrated the jazz legend's prickly exterior. Miles and Me seduces with hilariously mundane anecdotes.St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Troupe's book will keep Davis fans happy.Ebony Magazine
Introduces us to the moody genius of the jazz trumpeter and paints a candid portrait-full of imperfections and color-that gives us a rare window into Davis' world.Kansas City Star
An indispensable and entertaining look at the musical giant in his more mundane moments.St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Troupe's book will keep Davis fans happy.NY Times Book Review
[Troupe] gives the stories behind the collaboration, from his own introduction to Davis's music in the 1950s-and to Davis's stature as 'an unreconstructed black man'-up to Davis's death in 1991—Entertainment Weekly
Using refreshingly unscholarly language, poet and literature professor Troupe paints an aptly minimalist portrait of the artist as a man-child in both his musical curiosity and his irrational tantrums. Miles and Me is witheringly honest and deeply perceptive. A must-read for Davis devotees. A-Chicago Tribune
Many memoirs of friendships with famous people tend toward the sycophantic and predictable, but Quincy Troupe's Miles and Me is a vivid, complicated tribute to the legendary jazz musician.Flaunt
Troupe seems to have penetrated the jazz legend's prickly exterior. Miles and Me seduces with hilariously mundane anecdotes.St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Miles and Me attempts to give the legend and public persona of Miles Davis a human face. But the book's finest moments occur when Troupe reveals his own reactions to the personality-and especially the music-of Miles.Publishers Weekly
Growing up in St. Louis, Mo., in the 1950s, Troupe idolized jazz trumpeter Miles Davis, seeing him as an alternative to his own white-dominated neighborhood and high school. Miles, as a successful black man embodying all that was hip and proud, was a favorite role model for Troupe and his friends. Thirty years later, Troupe met his hero, and eventually collaborated with him on Miles: The Autobiography. Now he's documented his relationships with man and music in this slim, conversational volume. In casual, sentimental language ridden with gossipy details about Miles's Italian designer clothes, Troupe notes every interaction between Miles and himself that preceded their collaboration and relates favorite vignettes from that project. But what's notable about these anecdotes is how banal they are, from a story about an incompetent roadie, whom Miles predicted would drop everything because he "walked out of tempo," to Troupe's reflections on Miles's habit of hurling harsh insults at strangers who approached him. Although Miles's fans may be happy to read sketches from his life, this book works more as a commentary on the phenomenon of devoted fandom than as another biography of the trumpeter. The book's third section, in which Troupe (now a professor of literature at UC-San Diego) writes about how Miles affected his own coming-of-age, is by far the most compelling, because it deals with the emotional effects music can have upon its listeners--which is, after all, both the cause and the most lyrical side of fandom. 16 b&w photos not seen by PW. (Mar.) Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.|Library Journal
Miles Davis's open-mindedness toward innovation (musically and personally) set an example that inspired many of his listeners. He made young blacks in particular feel special and free; and some, like Troupe (Choruses, Avalanche), were able to use their imaginations in ways not probable without Davis. Pithy and succinct (one wishes he had written twice as much), Troupe continues to flesh out and demystify Davis in this follow-up to their collaboration, Miles: The Autobiography (LJ 10/1/89), and the Miles Davis Radio Project (a multipart radio series). Filled with "Milesian" humor and off-color language (those sensitive to gratuitous swearing may find this an arduous read), Troupe's book reveals Davis as profoundly, artistically sensitive yet maddeningly mean-spirited and rude. From his teenaged impressions during the 1950s to his mature, deeper reflections at the time of Davis's passing, numerous vignettes clearly show that a rewarding and richly hued relationship had developed between the two men. Recommended for public and academic libraries.--William Kenz, Moorhead State Univ. Lib., MN Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.\Dennis M. Fett
Miles and Me is witheringly honest and deeply perceptive. A must-read for Davis devotees.—Entertainment Weekly