Seven Steps to Heaven (album)

Seven Steps to Heaven is an album recorded in 1963 by Miles Davis. On the 16th and 17th of April, a quintet comprising Davis, George Coleman, Victor Feldman, Ron Carter and Frank Butler recorded all six tunes plus "Summer Night", for an album to be titled So Near, So Far. A month later, Davis re-recorded three of the tunes (tracks 2,4 & 6) with a new quintet, replacing Feldman with Herbie Hancock and Butler with Tony Williams. The new rhythm section of Hancock, Carter and Williams would form the nucleus of Davis's working band for the next five years. This is the last of Davis's studio albums which relies substantially on standard tunes - once Wayne Shorter joined the quintet in 1964, tunes on studio recordings were almost always composed by members of the group.

Tracks 1, 3 & 5 are tunes produced from the April session with Feldman, Butler, Carter and feature Davis in a quartet setting without Coleman.

[edit] Track listing

"Basin Street Blues" (Cootie Williams) April
"Seven Steps to Heaven" (Victor Feldman, Miles Davis) May
"I Fall in Love Too Easily" (Jules Styne, Sammy Cahn) April
"So Near, So Far" (Tony Crombie, Benny Green) May
"Baby, Won't You Please Come Home?" (Charles Warfield, Clarence Williams) April
"Joshua" (Victor Feldman) May

CD reissue includes an alternate take of "So Near, So Far" (from the April session) and "Summer Night", recorded by the Feldman/Butler quintet during the same sessions, but originally released on Quiet Nights. The alternate take of "So Near, So Far" produces a rare phenomenon - an alternate take with a different rhythm section. This would be no great deal were it not for the fact that Feldman and Butler were of such a startlingly different style from Hancock and Williams, almost of a different age.