Editing Portrait in Jazz (section)

==Background==
Eight months after his successful collaboration with [[Miles Davis]] on the album ''[[Kind of Blue]]'', Evans recorded ''Portrait in Jazz'' with a new group, the first Bill Evans Trio, that helped change the direction of modern jazz.

Most notably, LaFaro's bass is promoted from a mere accompanying instrument to one of almost equal status to the piano, although not to the extent that it would be on later albums such as ''[[Sunday at the Village Vanguard]]''. Evans said of LaFaro, "I was astounded by his creativity .... There was so much music in him, he had a problem controlling it. ... He certainly stimulated me to other areas, and perhaps I helped him contain some of his enthusiasm. It was a wonderful thing and worth all the effort that we made later to suppress the ego and work for a common result."<ref>Shadwick, Keith, ''Bill Evans: Everything Happens to Me'', Backbeat Books (2002), p. 82.</ref>

Motian had recorded previously with Evans on his debut album, ''[[New Jazz Conceptions]]'', as well as in groups led by [[Tony Scott (musician)|Tony Scott]], [[George Russell (composer)|George Russell]], and others.<ref>"Bill Evans Discography," https://www.jazzdisco.org/bill-evans/discography/, Accessed 23 June 2024.</ref> Evans biographer Keith Shadwick notes that Motian at this point tended to avoid standard bop formulas and would "react instead to what he actually heard coming from the other two musicians," which "added in no small degree to the unique quality of Evans's first working trio."<ref>Shadwick, p. 82</ref>