My People is an album by American pianist, composer and bandleader Duke Ellington written and recorded in 1963 for a stage show and originally released on Bob Thiele’s short-lived Contact label befor being reissed on the Flying Dutchman label and later released on CD on the Red Baron label. The album features recordings of compositions by Ellington for a stage show presented in Chicago as part of the Century of Negro Progress Exposition in 1963. (by wikipedia)
In a discography as large as Duke Ellington’s, it’s inevitable some records would fall by the wayside, and My People is one of them. Strangely, it is not a simple one-off session that was forgotten by the public at large. My People was a long-form work designed to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation, commissioned by the Century of Negro Progress Exposition, which ran the theatrical piece at McCormick Place in Chicago between August 16 and September 2, 1963. Not a small feat by any means, but the accompanying record got lost in time due to its weird release on Contact, a one-off indie run in secret by Bob Thiele, who had to keep its existence hidden from his employers at ABC-Paramount, where he was currently the head of Impulse! Records.
The focus of My People is on the drama that could be heard on-stage, so there are narrations — Duke himself testifies at the opening of “My People” — and an omnipresent vocal cast led by Joya Sherrill, a singer who received a “featuring” billing on the album cover. There’s a certain majesty to the spectacle of this extravagant work and there’s also heart here, one that is inextricably tied to the Civil Rights Movement of the ’60s. And yet, as a record, My People feels stagey and stuffy, with the emphasis falling on the florid vocal arrangements instead of the confident swing of the ensemble. A large work existing at the intersection of swing, blues, jazz, theater, and social activism is something to celebrate, but My People is a snapshot of a specific era and is most interesting as a representation of its time, not as an individual work. (by Stephen Thomas Erlewine)
And because this was an is a so important album, I add a long article about the story of this music.
Personnel:
Juan Amalbert (percussion)
Harold Ashby (saxophone, clarinet)
Louis Bellson (drums)
Joe Benjamin (bass)
Bill Berry (trumpet)
Pete Clark (saxophone, clarinet)
Chuck Connors (trombone)
Duke Ellington (piano, narrator)
Bob Freedman (saxophone)
Lil Greenwood (vocals on 06.
Jimmy Grissom (vocals on 06.
Ziggy Harrell (trumpet)
Jimmy McPhail (vocals on 01., 02., 03.
Ray Nance (cornet)
Rudy Powell (saxophone)
Russell Procope (saxophone, clarinet)
John Sanders (trombone)
Joya Sherrill (vocals on 05. + 08.)
Billy Strayhorn (piano)
Nat Woodard (trumpet)
Booty Wood (trombone)
Britt Woodman (trombone)
+
Irving Bunton Singers (choir on 02., 07, + 08.)
Tracklist:
01. Ain’t But the One/Will You Be There?/99%” 5.19
02. Come Sunday/David Danced Before the Lord 6.11
03. My Mother, My Father (Heritage) 2.54
04. Montage 6.57
05. My People/The Blues 8.49
06. Workin’ Blues/My Man Sends Me/Jail Blues/Lovin’ Lover 5.58
07. King Fit The Battle Of Alabam’ 3.29
08. What Color Is Virtue? 2.50
All compositions by Duke Ellington
Alternate frontcovers
Duke Ellington was the most important composer in the history of jazz as well as being a bandleader who held his large group together continuously for almost 50 years. The two aspects of his career were related; Ellington used his band as a musical laboratory for his new compositions and shaped his writing specifically to showcase the talents of his bandmembers, many of whom remained with him for long periods. Ellington also wrote film scores and stage musicals, and several of his instrumental works were adapted into songs that became standards. In addition to touring year in and year out, he recorded extensively, resulting in a gigantic body of work that was still being assessed a quarter century after his death. (by William Ruhlmann)
Duke Ellington’s work cannot possibly be summed up in one CD. Even his most important and influential work could barely make up a three CD collection. When I was beginning to get interested in Jazz, though, I wanted an album that, for a low price, would best represent what he has done for the world of jazz and music in the twentieth century.
Ellington ’66 is an album by American pianist, composer, and bandleader Duke Ellington that was recorded and released on the Reprise label in 1965.[1] The album won a Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Jazz .
Even better than the Ellington ’65 release , this great sounding cd has the Duke and the orchestra in fine form as it hits one home run after another from hits ranging from the Beatles to Tony Bennett. A real highlight is yet another take of “satin doll” which features Duke on piano mixing perfectly with the orchestra, something not heard on previous releases. “Days of wine and roses”, and “The good life” are just awesome, beautiful renditions of standards that just never grow old, and further prove that Duke could make beautiful music from any era and style. This is a highly recommended example of his genius, the only drawback is the brevity of the cd, just over thirty minutes. (Joseph D. Vinarski)
The inlets from the German edition
Ellington at Newport is a 1956 live jazz album by Duke Ellington and his band of their 1956 concert at the Newport Jazz Festival, a concert which revitalized Ellington’s flagging career. Jazz promoter George Wein describes the 1956 concert as “the greatest performance of [Ellington’s] career… It stood for everything that jazz had been and could be.”. It is included in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die, which ranks it “one of the most famous… in jazz history”. The original release partly recreated in the studio the Ellington Orchestra’s festival appearance.
the festival. Avakian mixed in the studio version with portions of the live performance. The applause was dubbed onto the original release to cover up the fact that Gonsalves had been playing into the wrong microphone and was often completely inaudible.
GRP has cobbled together a set of performances from labels it now has under its umbrella, such as Impulse and Cadet, as well as from albums released under its own name. There’s no intent here to put together a survey of the development of the tenor saxophone. Rather, this album is an unabashed effort to attract those who celebrate good tenor sax playing in general, and ballad sax in particular — and it works. If there were a hall of fame for tenor sax players, all the performers present on this disc would have been inaugural inductees. Coleman Hawkins, the first true tenor sax improviser, is represented with “Solitude” and “Mood Indigo” from the memorable recording he made with Duke Ellington; an added treat on “Solitude” is the fine violin playing of Ray Nance. John Coltrane’s inimitable ballad style is put on display with “You Don’t Know What Love Is” and “It’s Easy to Remember,” an effort by the Impulse label to make Coltrane more “popular” with jazz fans. The playing of the tenor saxophone’s psalm, “Body and Soul,” is awarded to Paul Gonsalves, who follows the improvisational path that Hawkins took on his 1939 recording. Ben Webster, James Moody, Sonny Stitt, Illinois Jacquet, and the soul-laden horn of Stanley Turrentine are also present.
The vast Duke Ellington songbook is always ripe for exploration, and the New York Trio, featuring pianist Bill Charlap, bassist Jay Leonhart, and drummer Bill Stewart, is up to the task. The gorgeous ballad “The Star Crossed Lovers” is in good hands, as Charlap gently examines the facets of this gem, accompanied by Leonhart’s spacious basslines and Stewart’s whispering brushes.
Duke Ellington & John Coltrane is a jazz album by Duke Ellington and John Coltrane recorded on September 26, 1962, and released in February 1963 on Impulse! Records.
Ella Fitzgerald’s outstanding songbook series has become an institution unto itself. This 1957 effort is distinguished from Fitzgerald’s other songbooks in that it is the only album in which the composer whose work she is singing actively participates.
swinging away; giving the listener a first-class trip to Harlem. Perdido and The E & D Blues are top-class jams from Ella and her fellas too which make any listener lost in jazz heaven. I’m Beginning To See The Light and Blip-Blip are such great expressions of joy & exuberance you can’t help but start snapping your fingers and tapping your feet too. On I Got It Bad, Ella cries her heart out making any listener weep along too.
Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington were (and are) two of the main stems of jazz. Any way you look at it, just about everything that’s ever happened in this music leads directly — or indirectly — back to them. Both men were born on the cusp of the 19th and 20th centuries, and each became established as a leader during the middle ’20s. Although their paths had crossed from time to time over the years, nobody in the entertainment industry had ever managed to get Armstrong and Ellington into a recording studio to make an album together. On April 3, 1961, producer Bob Thiele achieved what should be regarded as one of his greatest accomplishments; he organized and supervised a seven-and-a-half-hour session at RCA Victor’s Studio One on East 24th Street in Manhattan, using a sextet combining Duke Ellington with Louis Armstrong & His All-Stars. This group included ex-Ellington clarinetist Barney Bigard, ex-Jimmie Lunceford swing-to-bop trombonist Trummy Young, bassist Mort Herbert, and drummer Danny Barcelona. A second session took place during the afternoon of the following day. The music resulting from Thiele’s inspired experiment is outstanding and utterly essential. That means everybody ought to hear this album at least once, and many will want to hear it again and again all the way through, for this is one of the most intriguing confluences in all of recorded jazz. Armstrong blew his horn with authority and sang beautifully and robustly. “Azalea” is a harmonically pixilated melody with complicated, peculiarly rhymed lyrics composed by Duke many years earlier with Armstrong in mind. Other highlights include the bluesy “I’m Just a Lucky So and So,” a smoking hot, scat-laden rendition of “Cotton Tail,” and “The Beautiful American,” a marvelously modern exercise composed on the spot by Ellington that leaves one with the curious impression that Armstrong has just finished sitting in with Charles Mingus.
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