Speaking of Miles

Speaking of Miles. I was leaning on the barriers next to the Garden Stage at Nice. At my elbow was Dizzy. We were watching the George Wein all Stars. Miles had just finished his set and was being escorted back to the artists compound. As he came level with us Dizzy called to him. 'Hey Miles why do you play that shit ?' Miles without breaking stride raised his hand and rubbed his thumb and forefinger together in a money sign. It spoke volumes. Dizzy just chuckled and followed him into the artists area.

Miles Davis

One day Jim Campbell said to me, 'Why don't we get a stall at the Nice Jazz Festival and sell some posters of our shots we took last year.' I usually got hold of a press pass as a photo journalist, so I had lots of shots that I used as reference for airbrush drawings.
I designed and had printed 3 lots  of A2 posters of one set of each of Miles, Chuck Berry, and Lester Young, based on my drawings plus one set of Getz, Dexter Gordon and Johnny Hodges using black and white photos. On arrival in Nice Jim Campbell who was escorting Rose Hayes, decided he didn't want to have anything to do with the stall after all, and left me to set it up and man it.
I had a pitch next to the garden stage, against the arena perimeter. It was in full sun and blazing hot. The first day I sold one to a member of the Basie Band of Hodges, who asked for a pair of scissors and removed the part with Hodges on it, and discarded the rest.
The next day I had a visit from Miles's heavies, dressed in dark suits and shades, who pushed me up against the fence and stuck a gun in my ribs. 'Nobody sells pictures of Miles without our say so', said the one without the gun. 'But it's an air brushed drawing not a photo,' I said. The grip on my throat tightened. 'No one sells photos of Miles unless we say so, capiche ?
'Capiche', I said I'd had enough of being a lone stall holder. So I packed up and went to the merguez  stall and had merguez and frites and a bottle of Stella.
I left the posters in the cellar of the block of flats I was staying in. The original airbrush drawing of Miles hangs in my kitchen in Wimbledon, a constant reminder of my brush with Miles Davis.
By the way for those who are interested you can buy a copy of the above posters from my web site
www.martyapple.com