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January 11, 1974:
Replaying an old Miles Davis L.P., I recall one of my
encounters with the satanic elf. Some time late in the '50s I
went to Birdland to hear him. Between sets he joined our table
for a drink, and chatted in his rasping whisper quite amiably.
Suddenly we were approached by a timid white teen-aged boy
with an autograph album. Nervously he asked Miles for a
signature and as Miles obliged, he said: "I've always
admired you, Mr. Davis. I play trumpet in my high school band and I think you have a wonderful embouchure. How do you get an embouchure like that?” Miles said casually: “I got it from sucking off little white boys like you.” The boy absolutely froze. We all did. The words were spoken without passion, but they taught me more about feeling towards whites that dozens of liberal fund-raising sessions with Sidney Poitier and Harry Belafonte.
-- from the journals of Kenneth Tynan
Miles
Davis's hand, photographed by Irving Penn
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