By Loren Schoenberg, Conductor and Saxophonist These lists have been compiled with the newcomer to jazz in mind. We have shied away from compilations wherever possible, for the simple reason that you may very well wind up buying the complete albums that were excerpted in the compilations. Here you have a small but representative sampling of some of the very best music Miles Davis recorded in every period of his career, with as little duplication as possible. So What Recorded March 2, 1959 (Courtesy Columbia/Legacy) Spanish Key Recorded August 21, 1969 (Courtesy Columbia/Legacy) Birth of the Cool Blue Note Miles Davis & the Modern Jazz Giants Prestige Miles Ahead Columbia Kind Of Blue Columbia Miles Smiles Columbia Bitches Brew Columbia The NPR 100: Kind of Blue NPR's Tom Moon looks at this groundbreaking 1959 album by Miles Davis. A benchmark of improvisation and modal jazz, the disc is a selection from National Public Radio's list of the 100 most important American musical works of the 20th Century. (Courtesy NPRJazz.org)