Paving the Milestones

While sorting through some old files and stuff tonight, I came upon a treasure: my junior year College Prep English class research paper, dated May 11, 1987. It was entitled "Paving the Milestones (Miles Dewey Davis III)". The purpose of the research paper was to describe how an important individual has had an impact on society. I chose to do my research paper on Miles Davis because I was a jazzmaniac (I may need to get that word trademarked, by the way), and loved his music:

Little did I know how much my research into his persona, his "mystique", if you will, would affect me as an individual. There I was, an insecure junior in high school, struggling to find myself. And what joy I found by learning about the man, Miles Davis, who lived his life caring so much less about what other people thought than what he thought of himself. I decided to imitate his "devil may care" qualities, and it showed.

Toward the beginning of our research we all were called upon to present some preliminary findings to the class. Our presentation would be videotaped, and our peers would critique us. I was unprepared, anxious and insecure, as usual. But my zeal, enthusiasm, and overal 'jazzmania' (there's that word again), was definitely evident. I felt like the presentation was a disaster, but then again, I was the first presenter in our teacher's little experiment.

When the time came for us to give a final presentation, I again was chosen to go first. This time, armed with my own "mystique", I blew the class and my teacher away with an excellent presentation. First of all, I had purchased a toy trumpet. I began my presentation, with my back to my audience and played the tune most often heard at the beginning of horse races; it was the only one I knew how to play on that thing. Secondly, after explaining how Miles pioneered modalism with his album Kind of Blue, I played the opening riff of "So What" on my alto saxophone. My peers were, as I said, blown away. My teacher was impressed with my boldness. I got an "A".

I remember this event as though it was yesterday, for that moment is one when I saw myself very victorious.

21 Feb 2008 Update: Check out this blog post for a video of So What: Miles Davis knew how to play