Sketches of Spain
Studio album by Miles Davis
Released	July 18, 1960 (1960-07-18)[1]
Recorded	November 15 & 20, 1959 and March 10, 1960
Studio	Columbia 30th Street Studio, New York City
Genre	Third stream[2] orchestral jazz[3] Spanishclassical music[4]
Length	41:19
Label	Columbia
Producer	Teo Macero
Miles Davis chronology
Workin' with the Miles Davis Quintet (1960) Sketches of Spain (1960) Steamin' with the Miles Davis Quintet (1961)

Sketches of Spain is astudio album by Americanjazz musicianMiles Davis, released on July 18, 1960, byColumbia Records. Recording took place between November 1959 and March 1960 at Columbia's30th Street Studio inNew York City. An extended version of the second movement ofJoaquín Rodrigo'sConcierto de Aranjuez (1939) is included, as well as a piece called "Will o' the Wisp", fromManuel de Falla's balletEl amor brujo (1914–1915).Sketches of Spain is regarded as an exemplary recording ofthird stream, a musicalfusion ofjazz,European classical, and styles fromworld music.^[2]

Miles Davis's wifeFrances insisted he accompany her to a performance byflamenco dancer Roberto Iglesias. Inspired by the performance, Davis bought every flamenco album he could buy from the Colony Records shop in New York City.^[5]

The album pairs Davis with arranger and composerGil Evans, with whom he had collaborated on several other projects, on a program of compositions largely derived from theSpanish folk tradition. Evans explained:

[We] hadn't intended to make a Spanish album. We were just going to do theConcierto de Aranjuez. A friend of Miles gave him the only album in existence with that piece. He brought it back to New York and I copied the music off the record because there was no score. By the time we did that, we began to listen to otherfolk music, music played in clubs in Spain... So we learned a lot from that and it ended up being a Spanish album. The Rodrigo, the melody is so beautiful. It's such a strong song. I was so thrilled with that.^[6]

The folk songs in the album were inspired by recordings made byAlan Lomax inGalicia andAndalusia, which were released in 1955 byColumbia Masterworks.^[7][8]Sketches of Spain album was also the first Miles Davis album to be produced byTeo Macero,^[9]: 166 who would later produce many of Davis's works.

The opening piece, taking up almost half the record, is an arrangement by Gil Evans and Miles Davis of the adagio movement ofConcierto de Aranjuez, a concerto for guitar by the contemporary Spanish composerJoaquín Rodrigo. Following the faithful introduction of the concerto's guitar melody on flugelhorn, Evans's arrangement turns into a "quasi-symphonic, quasi-jazz world of sound", according to his biographer.^[6] The middle of the piece contains a "chorus" by Evans unrelated to the concerto but "echoed" in the other pieces on the album.^[6] The original melody then reappears in a darker mode.

Davis playsflugelhorn and later trumpet, attempting to connect the various settings musically.^[10] Davis commented at rehearsal, "The thing I have to do now is make things connect, make them mean something in what I play around it".^[10] Davis thought the concerto's adagio melody was "so strong" that "the softer you play it, the stronger it gets, and the stronger you play it, the weaker it gets", and Evans concurred.^[10]

According to Davis's biographer Chambers, the contemporary critical response to the arrangement was not surprising, especially given the scarcity of anything resembling a jazz rhythm in most of the piece.Martin Williams wrote that "the recording is something of a curiosity and a failure, as I think a comparison with any good performance of the movement by a classical guitarist would confirm". The composer Rodrigo was also not impressed, but royalties from the arrangement brought him "a lot of money", according to Evans.^[10]

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[11]
DownBeat	[3]
The Encyclopedia of Popular Music	[12]
MusicHound Jazz	[13]
The Penguin Guide to Jazz	[14]
Pitchfork Media	10/10[15]
PopMatters	10/10[16]
Q	[17]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide	[18]
Sputnikmusic	4/5[19]

In a contemporary review forDownBeat, Bill Mathieu hailedSketches of Spain as one of the 20th century's most important musical works so far and a highly intellectual yet passionate record. He found Evans's compositions extremely well crafted and Davis's playing intelligently devised, concluding in his review, "if there is to be a new jazz, a shape of things to come, then this is the beginning."^[3] Replying to suggestions thatSketches of Spain was something other than jazz, Davis said "it's music, and I like it."^[20] InThe Rolling Stone Album Guide (2004),J. D. Considine called it "a work of unparalleled grace and lyricism,"^[18] whileQ magazine said it "tookorchestral jazz in a new direction."^[17]Robert Christgau was less enthusiastic about the record and recalled being a young listener when it was released: "In 1960 [it] catapulted Davis into the favor of the kind of man who readsPlayboy and initiated in me one phase of the disillusionment with jazz that resulted in my return torock and roll."^[21]

ForSketches of Spain, Evans and Davis won the1961 Grammy Award forBest Jazz Composition of More Than Five Minutes Duration.^[22] The album was ranked number 358 onRolling Stone's list ofthe 500 greatest albums of all time.^[20][23]

• Sides one and two were combined as tracks 1–5 on CD reissues.

1. Concierto de Aranjuez was written about the gardens at theRoyal Palace of Aranjuez.
2. El amor brujo is often translated as "The Bewitched Love." It is a ballet by Spanish composer Manuel de Falla.
3. "The Pan Piper" refers to the instrument (pan flute) played by a pig's castrator and knife grinder and the melody he used to play when arriving to villages in Galicia. "Alborada" is a traditional folk style from Galicia.
4. "Saeta" is a type of religious song mostly sung during theSemana Santa (Holy Week) processions in Spain.
5. "Solea" is a form offlamenco music.

• Sketches of Spain Legacy Edition atMyspace (streamed copy where licensed)

• 1960 albums
• Albums arranged by Gil Evans
• Albums conducted by Gil Evans
• Albums produced by Teo Macero
• Albums recorded at CBS 30th Street Studio
• Columbia Records albums
• 1960s instrumental albums
• Miles Davis albums
• Classical albums by American artists
• Orchestral jazz albums

• Articles with short description
• Short description matches Wikidata
• Use American English from February 2026
• All Wikipedia articles written in American English
• Use mdy dates from February 2026
• Articles with hAudio microformats
• Album articles lacking alt text for covers
• Track listings with input errors
• Articles containing Spanish-language text
• Certification Table Entry usages for United Kingdom
• Pages using certification Table Entry with shipments figures
• Certification Table Entry usages for United States
• Pages using certification Table Entry with shipments footnote