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A At the age of thirteen, Miles Davis was given his first trumpet, lessons were arranged with a local trumpet player, and a musical odyssey began. These early lessons, paid for and supported by his father, had a profound effect on shaping Davis' signature sound. Whereas most trumpeters of the era favoured the use of vibrato( a wobbly quiver in pitch inflected in the instrument's tone), Davis was taught to play with a long, straight tone, a preference his instructor reportedly drilled into the young trumpeter with a rap on the knuckles every time Davis began using vibrato. This clear, distinctive style never left Davis. He continued playing with it for the rest of his career, once remarking，'If I can't get that sound, I can't play anything.'

[p:a] 十三岁时，迈尔斯·戴维斯得到了第一支小号，并在当地一位小号手的指导下开始学习音乐，由此开启了他的音乐之旅。这些早期的课程由父亲出资并支持，对塑造戴维斯标志性的演奏风格产生了深远影响。当时大多数小号手倾向于使用颤音（即音色中音调的波动），而戴维斯则被教导以长而直的音色演奏。据称，每当他开始使用颤音时，老师都会用敲击他手指关节的方式进行训练。这种清晰而独特的风格始终伴随戴维斯一生，直到职业生涯结束，他曾这样说道：“如果我无法达到那种声音，我就无法演奏任何东西。”

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B Having graduated from high school in 1944, Davis moved to New York City, where he continued his musical education both in the clubs and in the classroom.His enrolment in the prestigious Julliard School of Music was short - lived, however - he soon dropped out, criticising what he perceived as an over - emphasis on the classical European repertoire and a neglect of jazz. Davis did later acknowledge, however, that this time at the school was invaluable in terms of developing his early training took place in the form of jam sessions and performances in the clubs of 52nd Street, where he played alongside both up-and­coming and established members of the jazz pantheon such as Coleman Hawkins, Eddie 'Lockjaw ' Davis, and the Thelonious Monk.

[p:b] 1944年高中毕业后，戴维斯移居纽约市，在那里继续接受音乐教育，既在俱乐部演出，也在课堂学习。然而，他进入著名的朱利亚德音乐学院的学籍时间很短暂，不久便中途退学，因为他批评学校过度强调欧洲古典曲目，而忽视了爵士乐的发展。不过，戴维斯后来承认，这段经历对他的早期音乐训练极为宝贵，因为他在52街的俱乐部中通过即兴演奏和表演积累了经验，并与当时崭露头角及久负盛名的爵士乐大师们同台演出，例如科尔曼·霍金斯、埃迪·“锁牙”·戴维斯以及塞尔尼奥斯·蒙克。

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C In the late 1940s, Davis collaborated with nine other instrumentalists, including a French horn and a tuba player, to produce The Birth of Cool, an album now renowned for the inchoate sounds of what would later become known as 'cool' jazz. In contrast to popular jazz styles of the day, which featured rapid, rollicking beats, shrieking vocals, and short, sharp horn blasts, Davis' album was the forerunner of a different kind of sound - thin, light horn-playing, hushed drums and a more restrained, formal arrangement. Although it received little acclaim at the time (the liner notes to one of Davis' later recordings call it a 'spectacular failure'), in hindsight The Birth of Cool has become recognised as a pivotal moment in jazz history, cementing - alongside his 1958 recording, Kind of Blue - Davis' legacy as one of the most innovative musicians of his era.

[p:c] 20世纪40年代末，戴维斯与另外九位器乐演奏家合作，包括一支圆号和一支大号手，共同创作了专辑《酷的诞生》。这张专辑以后来被称为“酷爵士”的早期音色而闻名。与当时流行的爵士风格——快节奏、活泼的节拍、尖锐的演唱以及短促刺耳的铜管演奏不同——戴维斯的专辑开创了一种全新的音乐风格：轻盈纤细的铜管演奏、低沉静谧的鼓点，以及更为克制、正式的编曲结构。尽管当时这张专辑并未获得太多赞誉（戴维斯后期录音中的一张专辑的内页注释称其为“一场壮观的失败”），但回顾来看，《酷的诞生》已成为爵士乐史上的一个关键节点，与他1958年的《蓝调》一同确立了戴维斯作为时代最具创新精神的音乐家之一的地位。

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D Though Davis' trumpet playing may have sounded effortless and breezy, this ease rarely carried over in to the rest of his life. The early 1950s, in particular, were a time of great personal turmoil. After returning from a stint in Paris, in particular, were a time of great personal turmoil. After returning from a stint in Paris, Davis suffered from prolonged depression, which he attributed to the unravelling of a number of relationships, including his romance with a French actress and some musical partnerships that ruptured as a result of creative disputes. Davis was also frustrated by his perception that he had been overlooked by the music critics, who were hailing the success of his collaborators and descendants in the 'cool' tradition, such as Gerry Mulligan and Dave Brubeck, but who afforded him little credit for introducing the cool sound in the first place.

[p:d] 尽管戴维斯的长号演奏听起来轻松自如、风度翩翩，但这种轻松感却很少延续到他生活的其他方面。20世纪50年代初尤其是一段充满个人动荡的时期。在巴黎短暂逗留归来后，戴维斯长期遭受抑郁困扰，他将此归因于多段感情的破裂，包括与一位法国女演员的感情关系，以及因创作分歧而终止的一些音乐合作。此外，戴维斯还感到沮丧，因为他觉得自己的努力被音乐评论界忽视了。当时评论家们纷纷称赞他的合作者和后来者在“酷”（cool）传统中的成功，例如杰里·穆利根和戴夫·布鲁贝克，但却很少肯定他最初引入“酷”风格所做出的贡献。

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E In the latter decades of his career, Davis broke out of exclusive jazz settings and began to diversify his output across a range of musical styles. In the 1960s, he was influenced by early funk performers such as Sly and the Family Stone, which then expanded into the jazz­rock fusion genre -of which he was a frontrunner -in the 1970s. Electronic recording Effects and electric instruments were incorporated into his sound. By the 1980s, Davis was pushing the boundaries further, covering pop anthems such as Cyndi Lauper's Time After Time and Michael Jackson's Human Nature, dabbling in hip hop, and even appearing in some movies.

[p:e] 在职业生涯的后几十年，戴维斯逐渐摆脱了传统的爵士乐独奏环境，开始将音乐风格拓展至多种类型。20世纪60年代，他受到斯莱与家族石（Sly and the Family Stone）等早期放克音乐人的影响，随后这种风格在70年代进一步发展为爵士摇滚融合体——而戴维斯正是这一流派的先驱之一。电子录音效果和电声乐器被融入了他的音乐之中。到了80年代，戴维斯不断突破界限，演唱诸如辛迪·劳帕的《Time After Time》和迈克尔·杰克逊的《Human Nature》等流行金曲，还涉足嘻哈音乐，并参演了一些电影。

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F Not everyone was supportive of Davis' change of tune. Compared to the recordings of his early career, universally applauded as linchpins of the jazz oeuvre, trumpeter Wynston Marsalis derided his fusion work as being 'not true jazz', and pianist Bill Evans denounced the 'corrupting influence' of record companies,noting that rock and pop 'draw wider audiences'. In the face of this criticism, Davis remained defiant, commenting that his earlier recordings were part of a moment in time that he had no 'feel' for anymore.He firmly believed that remaining stylistically inert would have hampered his ability to develop new ways of producing music. From this perspective, Davis' continual revamping of genre was not merely a rebellion, but an evolution,a necessary path that allowed him to release his full musical potential.

[p:f] 并非所有人都支持戴维斯改变立场。与他早期职业生涯中那些被普遍赞誉为爵士乐奠基之作的录音相比，小号手温斯顿·马萨利斯嘲讽他的融合音乐作品是“非真正的爵士”，钢琴家比尔·埃文斯则谴责唱片公司的“腐蚀性影响”，指出摇滚和流行音乐“吸引了更广泛的听众”。面对这些批评，戴维斯依然坚持己见，表示自己早年的录音属于一个时代，而他已不再有那种“感觉”。他坚信，若在风格上保持僵化，将阻碍他发展出新的音乐创作方式。从这一角度来看，戴维斯不断革新音乐流派的行为不仅是一场叛逆，更是一种进化，是让他充分释放音乐潜力所必需的道路。