Harvard has an excellent "Working Knowledge" article on Mile Davis and innovation. It is an interview with HBS professor Robert D. Austin and Carl Størmer, founding principal of JazzCode, a consulting and entertainment firm specializing in improvisational collaboration and communication in high-performance teams. They do a great job of showing Davis as a master of innovation. It is full of leadership nuggets.. here is just one..

I think the experience in Paris where he composed and recorded a film score for director Louis Malle (for Elevator to the Gallows, 1958) in a single night was important. There he might have realized that simplicity was one way to create great music in a very short time. Maybe he realized that this recipe could be improved further: get good songs, simplify them as much as possible, get the best players in the world, and force them to listen to the music by not telling them what to do.

I am sure you will enjoy this regardless of whether you even know whoDavis was... and you might even learn a bit about music that will make you want to download some itunes.... Check it out