The Miles Davis Quintet – Relaxin' With The Miles Davis Quintet (OJC, Prestige)

The Miles Davis Quintet's Relaxin' with the Miles Davis Quintet arrived in 1958, drawn from the celebrated 1956 Rudy Van Gelder sessions that yielded four LPs and caught Miles Davis' first great quintet in unusually complete form. With John Coltrane, Red Garland, Paul Chambers and Philly Joe Jones alongside Davis, the album documents a working band whose easy interplay feels as important as any individual solo.

What makes Relaxin' so satisfying is the balance between polish and looseness. The material comes from songs the group was already shaping on stage, so even familiar standards and bop vehicles sound lived-in rather than merely repertory. Davis keeps the temperature cool and lyrical, Coltrane adds tensile momentum, and the rhythm section gives the record its unhurried swing, whether on the poised opener “If I Were a Bell” or the brisk “Oleo.”

This 2026 edition ties into the centennial celebrations for Davis and brings the album back through the Original Jazz Classics line, a fitting home for one of the key Prestige releases in his catalogue. For anyone building a jazz shelf, it is a sharp snapshot of the quintet before each member's legend fully hardened: relaxed in title, but fully alert in execution.

Features

• LP, 33RPM, 180g, Original Jazz Classics
• AAA lacquers cut from the original master tapes by Kevin Gray at Cohearent Audio
• Pressed at RTI
• Stoughton tip-on jacket with obi strip

Reviews

• Each of these is considered not only to be among the pinnacle of Davis' work, but of the entire bop subgenre as well. - AllMusic.com