Duke Ellington 1942 1944

Duke Ellington | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (July 28, 1998)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Classics
• ASIN: B000001NRX
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,478,895 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Perdido

2. C Jam Blues

3. Moon Mist

4. What Am I Here For?

5. I Don't Mind

6. Someone

7. My Little Brown Book

8. Main Stem

9. Johnny Come Lately

10. Hayfoot, Strawfoot

11. Sentimental Lady

12. A Slip of the Lip (Can Sink a Ship)

13. Sherman Shuffle

14. Boy Meets Horn

15. Hop, Skip and Jump

16. Things Ain't What They Used to Be

17. Main Stem

18. Creole Love Call

19. The Mood to Be Wooed

20. My Little Brown Book

See all 22 tracks on this disc

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Irreplaceable--the best raconteurs in American music., July 12, 2009

By 

Samuel Chell (Kenosha,, WI United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Duke Ellington 1942 1944 (Audio CD)

I'm not sure what inspired me (possessed me?) to purchase this, but I'm glad I did. These are recorded performances that are either unavailable or so scarce as to be available only at a usurer's rates. The audio quality is wonderful, and the music better. I may have picked it up to hear a forgotten Ellington gem called "I Don't Mind" (Bob Dorough's version on "Devil May Care" is unforgettably ultra-hip), but every track is a winner.

The experience is less of hearing a "band" than a splendiferous "conversation" among the best musical raconteurs who ever lived--Tricky Sam, Ivie Anderson, Herb Jeffries, Dizzy Gillespie (!), Al Hibbler, Sweet Pea, Carney and Hodges, Webster and Ray Nance, the impeccable Lawrence Brown, the dramatic (little heard) Wallace Jones. And there's a surprise with each new selection--things unheard played by the only musicians capable of making you hear them--for example, Rex Stewart and Cootie Williams ("Tootin' Through the Roof"--I can just see Duke sketching it in the back seat while chauffeur Harry Carney is scouting out the address of the night's venue) blowing up a storm, in perfect accord while reaching for the sky in 3rds after blowing the roof off.

Sadly, we've forgotten that Duke composed a concerto for Cootie Williams, who is also listed as primary composer of "Round Midnight" (sorry, Monk fans). And if there's a trumpeter who could make the horn talk (actually articulate verbal syllables but "on pitch") as well as Rex Stewart, the only potential rival who comes to mind is Clark Terry. The point is that all of the aforementioned three trumpet players were not simply Ellingtonian voices: they were shining stars.

If Louis Armstrong got the respect he deserved, certainly his glory would have rubbed off on these worthy successors. (Why not make it a requirement that any leader of our country be informed about its major musical geniuses and teachers--Armstrong, Ellington, Bird, Coltrane? Is it too much to expect that their importance extends to even Alaska? Certainly a political conservative should be highly keen on conserving the best of the past (in my experience, both parties are about equal in their knowledge of their own country's past cultural history and its living (providing it's allowed to thrive) legacy. (Despite his "country boy" reputation, Jimmy Carter did more for America's indigenous art form--and in a mere 4 years--than any other President during my lifetime.)

Don't start your Ellington collection with this one. But once you've become an Ellingtonian, count on it to support the camp that counts the early '40s ensembles as Duke's best.