Reminiscing In Tempo: A Portrait of Duke Ellington [Hardcover]

Stuart Nicholson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 9, 1999

Duke Ellington (1899-1974) was one of the most romantic, flamboyant, and charismatic figures in the world of jazz. This distinctive biography, published on the centenary of his birth, draws on rare archival material to interweave Ellington's own observations and reminiscences with those who knew and worked with him. The text also includes a wealth of Ellington memorabilia to re-create in vivid narrative and illustration the jazz great's life and musical artistry against the background of his colorful times.

Stuart Nicholson's skillful use of first-hand accounts allows the reader to fully experience Ellington's story and to relive the vibrant jazz scene in which he worked. The author charts the course of his brilliant career, from sign writer, pianist, and poolroom hustler in Washington, D.C., to star performer at Harlem's Cotton Club, to internationally acclaimed bandleader, composer, and arranger. He offers revealing insights into the private man, recounting his strengths, faults, humor, attitude toward business, and love of women. Nicholson also explores Ellington's struggles as a black artist in the white-dominated entertainment world.

This engaging and innovative biography provides the most authentic portrait yet available of the legendary jazz musician.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Nicholsons lively, unconventional biography of the great jazz composer, bandleader and pianist amounts to a kind of jazz collage. Keeping third-person historical narrative to a minimum, Nicholson (Billie Holiday) presents Ellingtons life through block quotes, arranging bits and pieces of some 70 years worth of painstakingly gathered interviews, Variety articles, press releases, handbills and even declassified FBI files into a composite narrative of the Dukes life. Among the notables whose words turn up are longtime Ellington collaborator Billy Strayhorn, show business impresario Irving Mills, saxophone great Johnny Hodges, New York congressman Adam Clayton Powell and, of course, Ellington himself. These accounts give a remarkably coherent picture: the Duke was widely beloved and clearly driven, a musician whose energy, appetites and inventiveness remain startling a quarter century after his death. Rich in personal anecdote and period detail, Nicholsons book charts Edward Kennedy Ellingtons childhood among Washington, D.C.s African-American middle class, his rise to fame in the storied speakeasies of Depression-era Harlem and his lifelong devotion to his crafta commitment that remained firm even as swing, and then rock n roll, threatened his cultural prominence. Nicholsons prodigious (and well-footnoted) archival research and his thoughtful orchestration of source material, let him combine accessibility with scholarly authority. The books title comes from a 1934 number Ellington penned to mourn the death of his mother; it sums up the sweetly nostalgic mood that this richly detailed biography creates. Illustrations.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Deftly weaving numerous and varied quotations from Ellington and his family, friends, and fellow musicians with an ongoing narrative, Nicholson, biographer of Ella Fitzgerald (LJ 5/1/94) and Billie Holiday (LJ 9/1/95), successfully brings a humanness and warmth to Americas finest composer, musician, and bandleader in this centennial year of his birth. Delving into a wide assortment of archival materials from the Smithsonian Institution and Rutgers Institute of Jazz Studies, Nicholson covers Ellingtons life from the early 1920s to his glorious period of dominance (mid1930s to 1944) and continuing through his death in 1974. Nicholsons selected quotes, constituting the bulk of the book, occasionally seem oddly juxtaposed, but generally this is a free-flowing portrait. The enormous amount of credited source material suggests potential for further scholarly insight into Ellingtons life. This book is a strong addition to other recent works on Ellington, including John Hasses Beyond Category (LJ 9/15/93) and Mark Tuckers The Duke Ellington Reader (LJ 9/1/93).William Kenz, Moorhead State Univ. Lib., MN
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Northeastern (April 9, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1555533809
• ISBN-13: 978-1555533809
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.5 x 1.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #384,621 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #23 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > Arts & Literature > Composers & Musicians > Jazz

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Musicians tell Duke's story - no holds barred., January 24, 2001

By 

Ian Muldoon (Coffs Harbour, NSW Australia) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Reminiscing In Tempo: A Portrait of Duke Ellington (Hardcover)

There are a handful of books about jazz which provide musical insights and feelings and opinions which pull the reader into the lives of those who do the job of making music - still probably the best is HEAR ME TALKIN' TO YA edited by Shapiro and Hentoff along with Stuart Nicholson author of A PORTRAIT OF DUKE ELLINGTON Reminiscing in TEMPO. Another is STRAIGHT LIFE, the story of ART PEPPER. This is not to deny the brilliance of FOUR LIVES IN THE BEBOP BUSINESS or MR JELLY LORD, but it is hard to match the excitement of reading the words of those who made the music, judiciously edited of course. A PORTRAIT OF DUKE ELLINGTON is up there with the best books I've read on jazz. Its added value is that its subject is one of the most important musicians of the 20th century. Its fascination is how his creative juices were pushed by the imperatives of the time - deadlines were something the Duke apparently thrived on. On the other hand, pigeonholing may have held him back from becoming an even greater composer. Some of the great scenes in the book include one recounted by Sonny Greer on a performance in England when the band preceding them on the programme suddenly stopped in the middle of its performance to play God Save the King - The Prince of Wales (nicknamed the Prince of Wails by Fats Waler I believe) had entered the auditorium. But this was nothing to the reception that the Ellington band received when it performed. They were not used to ten minute standing ovations. There's no getting past the fact that Europeans, or music lovers outside the States, seem to have taken "jazz" or "modern improvised music" much more seriously than the place of its birth. This may still be the case today. A PORTRAIT OF DUKE ELLINGTON also contains editorial factual comments, examples of bill posters, advertising, and a series of FBI Memoes which would be hilarious if they were not so frighteningly stupid. A PORTRAIT OF DUKE ELLINGTON is also an excellent social history of the time from the 20's to the 70's, at least from the perspective of members of the Ellington Orchestra. Vivid and touching portraits abound, including Junior Raglin, Bubber Miley, and Sweet Pea Strayhorn. There are a few guffaws, many chuckles and a few tears in this wonderful book. Especially for music lovers, but any intelligent reader would find much to enjoy about one story of America's greatest cultural contribution to the century past.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars it HAS got that swing, December 16, 2000

By 

Jimi Fallows (Liverpool, UK) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Reminiscing In Tempo: A Portrait of Duke Ellington (Paperback)

This is an extremely readable work. The author has compiled extracts from interviews with Ellington, band members and family spanning his life and career, presenting the material as an oral history. The reader is given a strong insight into how Ellington worked and what made him such a great and unique composer, band leader and human being. I found this book to be extremely involving, often moving me to laughter or tears. I would only complain that the writer has perhaps done too good a job editorially with his material in that he could have risked boring us a little by including much more. The upside of this is that the book should be enjoyable to anyone who has even the remotest interest in the man, the music or the period of his life. This book is an extremely fitting testament to a man who is without doubt one of the foremost figures in 20th Century culture .