“STOP trying to recreate and start creating,” bemoans the spectre of Miles Davis as Jay Phelps studies the tapes of his 1959 seminal album, Kind of Blue, in search of inspiration.

Phelps, a sought-after trumpeter on the contemporary London jazz scene whose talents are very much on show here, is clearly the catalyst for this two-handed theatrical homage to jazz’s most mercurial musician.

Initially Davis, played with cold, raspy clarity by newcomer Benjamin Akintuyosi, lives rent-free in Phelps’s mind but soon graduates to the foreground as we are led on a journey of his life and influences.

The story of young Miles is not one of rags to riches as he lets us know that “his father is rich and my mother is good looking — I can play the blues and I’ve never suffered.”

There is much suffering around him though as he climbs the musical ladder, joining the band of tortured soul Charlie Parker in 1945. Bird, as he was known due to his persuasion for fried chicken, was battling multiple addictions and failing to pay his band — a forewarning for what is to come.

The story of Miles’s ill-fated Parisian romance with singer Juliette Greco is also one defined by suffering and provides the visual highlight with striking use of projection. The same can’t be said for much of the other photo-montage style projection throughout, which feel more suited to a museum than a theatre, and distracting rather than complementary.

As we witness Akintuyosi’s clone-like Davis recover from the “hungry monster” of heroin addiction, he has lessons for Phelps. A scene where he tries to teach him the art of tap dancing and it’s multicultural roots illuminates the crux of the show — great art lives way beyond the artist’s lifetime.

Writer and director Oliver Kaderbhai makes a valiant attempt to find a unique angle on the life of a master musician but this “non-literal portrait,” as its billed, still feels to close to a conventional biographical retelling to truly catch hold.

Runs until March 7. Box office: (020) 7407-0234, southwarkplayhouse.co.uk.