Duke Ellington and Paul Gonsalves in 1963

(Photo is not from the Soccer Club)

Just before Duke Ellington and his orchestra played the week-long engagement at Gröna Lund in Stockholm in June 1963, a brief visit was made in Germany. We will let our members enjoy an unissued recording from a typical dance date for the US troops stationed in Germany. In this version of the Ellington band, Cat Anderson was missing and Rolf Ericson had just joined. The bass player was Eddie Shepard, who had a short stay with the band, a couple of years later he suffered a heart attack and died, but then he had already left the Ellington orchestra.

Diminuendo In Blue & Wailing Interval

The rest of this dance date (the long medley is omitted) can be found in the Goodies section.After the intro (Take The A Train), Hoagy Carmichael’s Stardust is played. This is of interest for the reason that it may very well be the first Rolf Ericson’s first recorded trumpet solo in the Ellington band. Rolf and Ray Nance trade 4-bar solos with each other and it is very easy to hear who is who. This is followed by Happy-Go-Lucky Local in which Ray Nance, Jimmy Hamilton and Duke himself are the main soloists. We next hear Jimmy Hamilton playing a fine solo in Deep Purple,  before it is time for Duke to play on one of his more rarely played compositions, Volupté. The program then continues with Diminuendo In Blue and the Wailing Interval (which you can listen to above) and after that the long Medley (which we have chosen to omit). In Perdido we again hear Rolf Ericson trade 4 bar solos with Ray Nance and as we know, Perdido would be one of the main solo vehicles for Rolf Ericson during his tenure with Duke Ellington The recording ends with a version of Monologue  and Tutti For Cootie.