Like most of us here at McKinney, I love me some NPR. NC Public Radio's office is just across the man-made river that runs through our campus, so it's hard to avoid listening. They recently did a great segment on the making of Miles Davis' classic album, "Kind of Blue." I think KOB was the first jazz album I ever bought (Davis' "Sketches of Spain" being the second), and the songs on there are so famous they need no explanation here. What I found interesting was what the band had to say about the making of the album. There are some really interesting comments on how Davis pushed his musicians to be more creative and break new musical ground. Two points stuck with me from the interviews. First, Miles pushed people out of their comfort zones because he wanted them to abandon anything familiar, easy, or formulaic. He wanted people to be right on the edge, where they were not sure what would come next when they improvised. Second, he spent a lot of time telling people what not to do, but gave very little specific direction on what to do. I'm not sure how much of this would work in an agency environment, but it's fun to think about.

Check out the interviews at:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=99805408