"Straight, No Chaser" from Miles Davis's 1958 sessions is a fiery romp through Thelonious Monk's classic blues at a blazing 297 BPM, featuring four soloists in extended improvisations. Davis opens with thirteen choruses of trumpet, his solo a master class in building tension and releasing it over the 12-bar blues form in F. Coltrane follows with a staggering twenty-one choruses of tenor saxophone, one of his longest recorded blues improvisations, his relentless energy and harmonic daring pushing the music to its limits. Adderley then delivers twenty choruses of alto that match Coltrane's intensity with a more blues-rooted approach. Evans closes with seven choruses of piano that provide a cooler contrast to the preceding saxophone onslaught. The performance is an extraordinary document of competitive inspiration, as each soloist drives the next to greater heights. At nearly three hundred beats per minute, the tempo demands supreme technical facility, and all four soloists deliver with breathtaking assurance. The sheer length of the improvisation section, totaling sixty-one choruses, makes this one of the most extended performances in Davis's recorded output.
