Tutu

The album is Davis's tribute to Archbishop Desmond Tutu. It was planned at one stage as a collaboration with Prince, who pulled out for undisclosed reasons, and Davis worked instead with the bassist Marcus Miller. Miller wrote and arranged all the songs apart from Tomaas, co-written with Davis, Backyard Ritual by George Duke, and Perfect Way by David Gamson and Green Gartside of Scritti Politti. He also played most of the instruments, including bass, synthesizers, drum machines, bass clarinet and soprano saxophone. Backyard Ritual was recorded at Le Gonks in West Hollywood, and Tommy LiPuma and Miller produced.

Critics were divided. Robert Palmer said in the New York Times that it already sounded curiously dated, while Robert Christgau thought it Davis's best in a decade and the writer Mike Zwerin called it the best jazz record of the decade. George Cole noted in 2011 that George Benson, Al Jarreau and Cassandra Wilson had recorded the title track. Davis won the Grammy for best jazz instrumental performance, soloist, and Eiko Ishioka, who art-directed the Irving Penn cover, won the 1987 Grammy for best album package. A deluxe edition adds a live disc from the Nice festival in July 1986, and Miller toured the album as Tutu Revisited in 2010.