Miles Smiles

Recorded over two days in October 1966, it is the second of six albums by the quintet of Davis, Wayne Shorter, Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter and Tony Williams. The music explores modal playing with looser forms. On Orbits, Dolores and Ginger Bread Boy Hancock drops left-hand chords and plays right-hand lines only. On Eddie Harris's Freedom Jazz Dance the quintet inserted extra bars between the phrases and played it slightly faster.

Footprints, by Shorter, was first recorded for his own Adam's Apple but reached release first here. Footprints and Ginger Bread Boy stayed in Davis's live book, Dolores is known from a single recording in spring 1967, and Footprints appears on the Live in Europe 1967 and Live in Europe 1969 bootleg volumes.

John Norris in Coda called the group one of the most beautifully integrated ever to play jazz and singled out Davis's waltz Circle as a masterpiece. Nat Hentoff in Stereo Review called the rhythm team the most stimulating Davis had had, and Martin Williams in Saturday Review called it Davis's best album in some time. Reviewing the 1992 CD reissue, Q called Footprints and Dolores all-time great jazz compositions. The album was nominated at the 1968 Grammys and entered the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2016.