Duke Ellington - Four symphonic works

Here's some commentary and a book review about Ellington from a recent "New Yorker" article. It talks about how he composed pieces and puts some perspective on how difficult it was for him to perform for most of his career.

For a list of Ellington CDs, go to
http://ellingtonweb.ca and click on "CD Cross-referenced Song Lists" on the left.

Duke's music was incredibly varied - to hear a sampling that shows his early development and a variety of his styles, by no means complete, click the next link, "Ellington 78 RPM Record Labels," and listen to the sound clips for the following:
Creole Love Call (DE2709c)
Black and Tan Fantasy (DE2710c )
Mood Indigo (DE3015b)
Eerie Moan (DE3301e)
Daybreak Express (DE3313d)(this one started me on his music)
Caravan (DE3611e)
Ko-Ko (DE4005d)
Flamingo (DE4036b)
John Hardy's Wife (DE4105d)
I Got It Bad, and That Ain't Good (DE4115b)
Moon Mist (DE4201d)

The DE numbers are a reference to the New Desor discography, and I've added them here so you'll exactly which recording I refer to.

I've sorted the labels by period, so use the first two digits after DE as a clue to the page they're at.

If you prefer symphonic jazz, most of these won't do it for you, but listen a couple of times and you may find yourself hooked anyway. The man was a great composer and he surrounded himself with top performers. Traditional they were not.



t will show you the variety of his music are Black and Tan Fantasy (1920s)

I have: The Ellington Suites, Ellington Indigos, Side by Side (Duke Ellington & Johnny Hodges), Back to Back (Duke Ellington & Johnny Hodges) and Duke Ellington, Piano in the Background and they are all very good....to my taste.

Agree that Ellington is one of the elite musical giants of the 20th century.

With digital remasters and all, there is so much for music and audio buffs to explore with Duke Ellington these days!

The only Duke Ellington I have is Money Jungle with Charles Mingus on bass and Max Roach on drums. It is quite good. I am going to look for some more today. What would you suggest?

Taste is individual, but a couple other Jazz/ Classical collaborations to consider:
Claude Bolling and JP Rampal's "Suite for Flute and Jazz Piano" (and several follow-up collaborations).
Gerry Muligan's "Symphonic Dreams"
Lalo Schriffin "Jazz Meets Symphony"

Thanks guys. I have just recently really discovered all the talent of Duke Ellington ...thanks to Audiogon and I am thrilled ! I have recently purchased the following: The Ellington Suites, Ellington Indigos, Side by Side, Back to Back and Piano in the Backround. Truly a genius ! I will soon check out The Far East Suite.

If you can find it.....the "Symphonic Ellington"-issued first on Reprise,reissued on Discovery and re-reissued on the complete Ellington on Reprise Mosaic collection.Is the great Ellington album that was recorded by him,in his lifetime.The pieces are "Night creature" 'Harlem" "Non-violent integration" and "La Scala"-all these were collaborations with Symphony orchestras in Paris,Milan,Hamburg and Stockholm.These were recorded in 1963 while on tour in Europe.Of course,Duke did not need a symphonic orchestra with his amazing own orchestra so there are very few collaborations.Beware of Classical/Jazz fusion projects,they rarely turn out well and have since ended up on the musical junkpile.Check out "THE FAR EAST SUITE" by Ellington-late 60's Rca Victor.The magic of the annotated and improvised abound there!

McCoy Tyner has a CD on Impulse label a few years back with jazz/symphonic interpretations of several Burt Bacharach tunes. Its a very interesting listen though I do not think it was exceptionally well received by critics/purists.

[url]http://www.amazon.com/What-World-Needs-Now-Bacharach/dp/B000003N8M[/url]

There is also this (I have the original lp) which is a very unusual concoction:

[url]http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000V6ONKQ/ref=dm_sp_alb[/url]

Others I can recommend more on the rock/jazz/classical fusion front are "The Snow Goose" by Camel [url]http://www.amazon.com/Snow-Goose-Camel/dp/B00005V1B2[/url] and "Caravan and the new Symphonia" by Caravan [url]http://www.amazon.com/Caravan-New-Symphonia/dp/B00005A46V[/url].