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Duke Ellington: The Duke At Fargo 1940 Special 60th Anniversary Edition
by Chris Mosey
An historic double album, the only one to feature the Duke Ellington band in the greatest of its many incarnations, playing a dance date. It captures the immediacy and chaotic magic of the 1940 orchestra in a way the carefully manicured studio recordings and even radio broadcasts of the time just can't do. It happened like this: on November 7 1940, after receiving permission from Ellington and the William Morris Agency in New York, Jack Towers and ...
Continue ReadingJazz, Politics, Edward Kennedy and the Ghosts of Richard Nixon: Our American Dialogue and the Hatfields and McCoys
by Carl L. Hager
To get into heaven, don't snap for a seven Live clean, don't have no fault Oh, I take the gospel, whenever it's possible But with a grain of salt --"It Ain't Necessarily So," from Porgy & Bess by George and Ira Gershwin Edward Kennedy Ellington celebrated his 70th birthday at the White House, where he received the first Presidential Medal of Freedom awarded by the newly inaugurated chief ...
Continue ReadingDuke Ellington: Carnegie Hall Concerts
by AAJ Italy Staff
Non è certo facile condensare in una recensione la mole di musica contenuta in questo cofanetto: otto CD che riuniscono i quattro concerti presentati da Duke Ellington nella leggendaria Carnegie Hall di New York. Si tratta di una delle fasi più creative del Maestro, qui in grado di mantenere quanto aveva sviluppato per accompagnare gli show del Cotton Club o il ballo dei jitterbug, ma libero di andare oltre le imposizioni di tali contesti. La sua arte pescava senza pudori ...
Continue ReadingDuke Ellington Tames The Savage Beasts: Lions and Tigers and Bears (and Gazelles!)
by Dan Bilawsky
I begin this edition of Old, New, Borrowed and Blue with a confession. I have an unabashed love for the music of Duke Ellington. From his brilliantly scored compositions, to the singular instrumental personalities in his band(s)--with Ellington, Jimmy Hamilton and Johnny Hodges ranking at the top of my list--Ellington seems to transcend the “big band" tag and his music really deserves the designation of “fine art." Writers have been treating this music as such for over seventy five years, ...
Continue ReadingDuke Ellington: Chicago 1946 & Cornell University 1948
by George Kanzler
Duke EllingtonChicago 1946MusicMasters-Nimbus2009 Duke EllingtonCornell University 1948MusicMasters-Nimbus2009 The depth and breadth of the Ellington Orchestra's repertoire/book over the half-century Duke led the band is mind-bogglingly vast. And commercially-released studio recordings are only the tip of the iceberg. There are compositions, versions of tunes and unique collaborations contained on these two albums found either nowhere ...
Continue ReadingDuke Ellington London and New York 1963-1964 The Great Concerts, The Duke of Elegant - Gems From the Duke Ellington Songbook
by Andrew Velez
Duke EllingtonThe Great Concerts (London & New York 1963-1964) Musicmasters-Nimbus 2009 Various ArtistsThe Duke of ElegantHighNote2009 “First of all the kids in the band want you to know they love you madly" are debonair Duke Ellington's playful opening remarks on this live concert set. Those “kids" he refers to are an incredible array of ...
Continue ReadingDuke Ellington: Symphony of the Body and Soul
by Raul d'Gama Rose
A study in sepia It was the package that arrived, which prompted me to open an album of memories in the first place. Looking at the photograph, I recall some--not all--of the many details of the evening it was taken. The boy in the photograph is I, and I am in a black mood. Suddenly my memory stirs vigorously, and it is then that I to go back to a dusky evening in 1963. My father who is ...
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