THE MILES DAVIS GRADUATE SCHOOL OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

by Mike Zwerin

ARIS, 20 October 1997- In a speech to co-workers and associates in June 1996, the President and CEO of First USA Bank, Inc, Richard W. Vague, said that he would like his bank to function like Miles Davis' band.

First USA specializes in credit cards and has done so well that a year after Mr Vague's motivational address the bank has been bought by BancOne of Ohio for $7.9 billion. Before the purchase, First USA was the fourth largest such bank, with 16 million card- holders. The merged entity will be third largest, with 32 million card-holders and $35 billion in assets.

First USA has succeeded by designing credit cards for areas of strong common interest - professional women, psychologists, golfers and, as of last May, jazz fans. Holders of its new "real jazz platinum Visa card" will receive a newsletter named after the Thelonious Monk song Brilliant Corners, a Diana Krall video, a previously unreleased John Coltrane CD, and miscellaneous gifts and discounts. The smart jazz designs on the cards includes a portrait of Miles Davis playing his horn.

Jazz Platinum Visa cards will entitle their holders to borrow from $5,000 up to $100,000. Note the bottom limit. First USA does not want to bother with jazz aficionados who need less than $5,000. Chump change. Miles would certainly approve.

Miles believed that the more outrageous a musician's monetary demands, the more respect he received. And the more money impresarios paid him, the more they'd pay for publicity to protect their investment. He was paid a lot of money because he knew his own worth. And now it seems that money and Miles Davis go together in more ways than you might have imagined. The time is ripe for a Miles Davis degree in business administration.

Consider this a new social perspective more than a product launch. Jazz players and fans were once one of the most alienated sectors of American society. After poets, maybe. The music drew its strength from being made by cultual minorities (African Americans, Latinos and Jews) and appreciated by economic minorities (African Americans and hipsters). Being known as "intellectual minority music" was a kind of hip badge of courage.

A mass audience and owning a swimming pool in Malibu were per se signs of loss of authenticity; "selling out" it used to be called. True jazz fans gave up on Louis Armstrong after Hello Dolly; and on Miles Davis after Bitches Brew. Much too successful. Well, now it seems that times are changing.

This is a major shift in the balance of forces on the alienation front. What's good for jazz is now good for the country. The business of America is jazz. This is not to say that jazz has ceased being minority music. On the contrary. A new minority has been added - people with ears and wallets stuffed with plastic.

Growing up in Dallas and Houston, Vague played guitar and keyboards. His father listened to jazz records. Little Richard's favorite was Miles Davis' All Blues. During his address to colleagues, President and CEO Richard W. Vague said: "...Miles Davis dominated jazz music in the late 50s and early 60s. The jazz scene then was characterized by groups of three to six pieces, typically including drums, bass, piano, saxophone and trumpet. They would play either an original song or a popular composition such as My Funny Valentine or I Got Rhythm and they would reinvent that song with extended improvisational solos, new chords and harmonies, syncopation, tempo changes and complex musical interplay. And these groups were generally comprised of one or two star performers surrounded by a bunch of ordinay performers known as 'sidemen.'

"The boldest, most daring thing about Miles - the thing that set him apart from almost all his contemporaries - was that he always, always hired musicians who were better than he was. Better technically, better composers, better improvisers. And not just a little bit better, but a whole lot better."

Mr. Vague pointed out that each member was so musically accomplished and they all knew each other so well that "anyone in the group could take the lead to slow down or step up the tempo and everyone else would follow...The group did not stand or fall on the ideas or compositions of one 'star.'" Innovation, he said, could come from any one, any time, anywhere.

His thrust was that he does not want his people explaining that they do certain things "because Dick Vague said so." He would like everything to be "justified on its own merits."

"Now I'm not nearly so naive or presumptuous to think that there is much of an analogy between Miles Davis' group and First USA," he said. "But we must have the very best people, and we must have the kind of supportive, inclusive environment where the very best can thrive - we aspire to many of the things characterized by Miles' band."

Interviewed recently from Dallas by telephone, Mr Vague explained: "There is a move away from mass marketing today, towards segmentation. We are less concerned with the breadth of a market than with the substance. We're interested in the enthusiasm and the depth of feeling rather than something large and superficial; we are interested in small but intense markets.

"First USA has 32 million customers. We're betting that between 50,000 and 200,000 of them are real jazz enthusiasts,." Mr Vague said.

An edited version of this article first appeared in the business section of the International Herald Tribune.