Home » Ellington Study Group Conference
Category Archives: Ellington Study Group Conference
Andrew Homzy on Idiom ’59
On June 26-27 1959, Duke Ellington appeared at a four-day jazz festival in Tamiment-In-The-Poconos, Pennsylania. Here he presented a new fourteen-minute work called Idiom ’59.
One week later, on July 4 1959, he played it again (in a slightly different version) at the Newport Jazz Festival and possibly at other festivals during the summer.
On September 8, Ellington and the band went into Columbia’s 30th Street Studios to record Idiom ’59 and other highlights of the summer tour. Ten of them – including Idiom ’59 – were issued on the Festival Session album in 1960. The original version – Columbia CL 1400 – was in mono but a stereo version was issued later in the year by CBS France.
After the Columbia recording, Idiom ’59 disappeared from the Ellington repertoire and went into a kind of shadow land. It “attracted little critical attention” (Boyes) and did not create much enthusiasm among Ellington experts and aficionados. When Eddie Lambert wrote about the work in his Listerner’s Guide, he says that “neglect and obscurity have been its lot” even if he considers that there is “enough of fine music to deserve more”.
With this background, it was very welcome that the Ellington ’88 conference in Oldham allowed Idiom ’59 to have a little bit of a comeback.
The Ellington ’88 Orchestra featured it in its “Extended Ellington” concerts and this was preceded by an outstanding presentation of the work by Andrew Homzy – Professor of Jazz Studies at Concordia University in Toronto at the time and a specialist in extended jazz works.
Before coming to Oldham, Homzy had transcribed and analyzed Idiom ’59 in detail. For this he had used three different issues of the Festival Session LP (see below). To the benefit of the conference participants (and now also the readers of this article), he had summarized his work in an eleven-page handout. It goes through the work bar-by-bar and gives a number of examples, which illustrate the work’s motifs and their development.
It is highly recommended to digest it before listening to the presentation. It can be downloaded here.
With the lecture, Homzy wanted to take the listeners through Idiom ’59 to present some of the things he had “discovered in this piece of music to show the strength, the intelligence, the soul, the beauty of Duke Ellington’s work as a composer”.
Roger Boyes was in the audience and got very enthusiastic about Homzy’s presentation. An article he published in Blue Light in 2010 reflects this. “A fascinating paper” he says. Boyes’ full article is available here and we are grateful to Roger to have been allowed to draw from it for this article.
Smått och gott / Bits and Pieces
Next DESS meeting
It takes place on Monday September 17 at Franska Skolan in Stockholm. The doors open at 17:00.
Bo Lindström, well-known international author and specialist on early jazz, will talk about the background to his acclaimed book about Tommy Ladnier (co-written with Dan Vernhettes) and his new book on the early Fletcher Henderson trombone player George Brashear.
Bo and Dan Vernhettes have written several other books together like Jazz Puzzles with biographies of early New Orleans jazz muscians (vol 1) and about the riverboat jazz history (vol 2).
They and other books can be ordered from the JazzEdit website (http://www.jazzedit.org).
Next Ellington Study Group conference
It seems likely that it will take place in Washington D.C. in March 2020. Anna Celenza, Professor of Music at the Georgetown University, is the driving force behind this initiative to keep the Ellington conferences going. It will be the fourth such conference in Washington D.C. since the series started.
Ellington OKeh recordings
In a follow-up to his article in “Smått och gott published on May 30, Bo Lindqvist has taken a closer look at the LP-album “The Ellington Era” (Columbia C3L-27).
He writes to the website: “According to Rust’s Jazz Records (at least the editions 4 and 6) and the album booklet, three previously ’unknown’ takes, Black And Tan Fantasy (81776-A), Old Man Blues (404521-D) are Mood Indigo (400023-A) are included
However, after having listened to the three takes, it seems to me”, says Bo, “that they all are identical to take B of the recording, which was issued on 78s long before the Columbia LP album appeared.”
DESS Bulletin 2016-3
With the publication of the DESS Bulletin 2018-3, the third Bulletin from 2016 is now available to the general public. It can be found under the Bulletinen tab at the top of the front page.
The main focus in this issue is Willie Cook but there are of course much more to read about.
New pods at Ellington Reflections
The excellent Ellington blog (https://ellingtonreflections.com/) has published three new pods since the start of the summerbreak of the DESS website.
They are:
Piano in The Foreground II (28 July 2018)
Portrait of Al Hibbler (14 July 2018)
Beyond the Valley of The Usual Suspects (30 June 2018)
They can be listened to at the website and downloaded from iTunes (https://t.co/2yKFpLm0jF).
Ellington ’89 in Washington D.C. (6)
In their conference folders, the participants in Ellington ’89 found an invitation to a very special event.
The Washington jazz broadcaster and Ellington aficionado Felix Grant had spent a lot of time and energy to find Ellington’s birthplace in Washington D.C. Once he had found it, he lobbied hard the U.S. Congress and local authorities to have a memorial plaque installed on the site.
Finally, he got what he had strived for and on the last day of the conference, the plaque was unveiled.
Despite some cancellations, the conference participants could also enjoy presentations and music during the last day of the conference.
The first speaker of the day was Dr. Jerome Sashen, who provided a “Psychoanalysis of Ellington’s Music”.
In the afternoon, Sjef Hoefsmit did a presentation on “Ellington’s Train” A soundfile of the presentation was included in the first article on the conference. Here is the video version.
He was followed by Don Miller, President of the Chicago Chapter of the Duke Ellington Society and one of the instagators of the Ellington conferences. He gave a brief presentation on what was available at that time of Ellington’s music on CD. He had found that some 75 CDs of this kind had been issued at the time!
The Danish jazz researcher and jazz critic Erik Wiedeman was the last speaker at the conference. His topic was “Ellington in Denmark” and the presentation included a lot of musical examples.
Part of the afternoon was also a concert – “Program of Ellington’s Music” – with Ronnie Wells and her students from the University of Maryland.
The DESS member Peter Lee was the only Swedish participant at the conference. Also Alice Babs and her husband Nils were there but they were considered as Spanish.
Peter remembers that he thought that the organization of the conference could have been better since almost a quater of the scheduled speakers never appeared. But there were a lot of good things and Peter remembers particularily
- The day at the Smithsonian. Besides the presentations, he was happy to be able to see the documentation on Ellington’s Honorary Membership of the Swedish Royal Academy of Music.
- Among the presentations, Peter rembers the one by Sjef Hoefsmit’s on ”Ellington´s Trains” as the best. “It was very well structed and very thourough”, he says.
- The unveiling of the Memorial Plaque on the site where Ellington was also “quite special” and so was the “lunch afterwards with only me and Alice Babs. She wanted to have the opportunity to speak some Swedish”.
- The big band concert with Jimmy Hamilton and Herb Jeffries.
The full text of Peter’s comments in Swedish is in the Washington 1989 part of the Ellington Archive.
This is the last article in the Ellington ’89 series. The DESS website likes to thank in particular Ted Hudson and Peter Lee for help with photos and Ted and Bob Reny for help with contacts in Washington D.C.
Ellington ’89 in Washington D.C. (4)
The second day of the conference also had a very full program.
and the President of Chapter 90 of the Ellington Society, Terrell Allen, guided the audience through it with firm hands but also with a lot of jokes.
It started with the handing over of the Eddie Lambert gavel and some welcoming words.
Then Jerry Valburn asked Sjef Hoefsmit, Klaus Strateman, Gordon Ewing and “the young man” Steven Lasker to join him at the podium for a discussion on ongoing research about Ellington.
The full video of the panel discussion is in Ellington Archive
Kurt Dietrich from Ripon College in Ripon, Wisconsin then took the floor. He came to the conference to tell about his PhD work on Lawrence Brown and to get some feed-back from the Ellington specialists gathered at the conference.
Follwing his doctoral dissertation and a number of journal articles, he published in 1999 his book, Duke’s ’Bones: Ellington’s Great Trombonists. It was follwed 10 years later by another book on a similar topic Jazz ’Bones: The World of Jazz Trombone. Both are highly recommended!
Another speaker during the second day was Andrew Homzy from Concordia University in Montreal, Canada – musicologist, arranger, big band leader, Duke Ellington as well as Charlie Mingus specialist and much more. He was a well-known profile at many Ellington Study Group conferences and is still an important part of the international network of Ellington aficionados and specialists.
This time he talked about Ellington’s La Plus Belle Africane.
Two other speakers during the second day were Bruce Kennan, member of the New York Chapter of the Duke Ellington Society, and Martin Williams.
The topic for Kennan’s presentation was “Spoken Ellington” and he let the the audience listen to excerpts from a number of Ellington interviews.
Martin Williams spoke about “Stealing from the Duke” and made his point with musical examples.
The other presentations from the second day of the Washington ’89 conference will be included in a later article together with some from the third day.
The day ended with a concert by Doug Richard’s The Great Americ Music Ensemble, which gave a panorama of Ellington’s music from the late 20’s to the late 50’s. Here is a tidbit from the concert. The full one will be included in the next article.
Ellington ’89 in Washington D.C. (3)
The report from Ellington ’89 that appeared in the 1989-3 issue of the DEMS Bulletin, says “that visitors from abroad appreciated the Smithsonian all-day as ideal”.
For most of them, it was the first visit to the Smithsonian Institution and its National Museum of American History and they got treated to a full day of presentations on the Ellington Collection established the year before.
The Director of the National Museum of American history, Robert G. Kennedy, welcomed the conference participants to the museum and introduced the Ellington Collection together with John E. Hasse, Curator of American Music since 1984.
Hasse also spoke about the museum’s collection on “Development of Jazz” more generally.
Mark Tucker, who had been among the first to make use of the Ellington Collection for his research, followed Hasse and spoke about the music in the Collection
In the afternoon session, there were presentations by, among others, Martin Williams and Patricia Willard.
Williams, the author of many book on jazz, presented his work for the Smithsonian on an upcoming book-and-record-set to be called “Duke Ellington: Masterpieces 1926-1968“.
Unfortunately, for a number of reasons, the album never appeared.
However, in 1994 John E. Hasse produced for the Smithsonian Collection of Recordings a two-CD set with a 28-page booklet. Slightly paraphrasing the title of his book on Ellington published the year before, It was called “Beyond Category: The Musical Genius of Duke Ellington“.
The topic for Willard’s presentation was “Billy Strayhorn and the Ellington Collection”. She really foreshadows the importance of the Ellington Collection to ensure Strayhorn’s proper place in the Ellington legacy.
Other presentations on the Ellington Collection during the day – like the one by Marcia Greenlee on “The Smithsonian’s Oral History Project On Duke Ellington” – can be found in the Ellington Archive.
Congressman John Conyers, who had been instrumental in securing Congressional funding for the Ellington Collection, and Mercer Ellington were honored guests at the opening. Their speeches are also in the website’s Ellington Archive.
Finally, after a long day, it was time to summarize and thank everybody. John Hasse did this.
Ellington ’89 in Washington D.C. (2)
Following the very successful and almost legendary Ellington ’88 conference in Oldham, England, the Ellington Study Group Conference returned to Washington D.C. for its 7th edition. It took place on April 28-29, 1989 and was proceeded by a full day symposium at The Smithsonian and its National Museum of American History.
The Duke Ellington Society Chapter 90 was responsible for the conference. Its long-standing President Terrell Allan was chairman of the organizing committee and Ann Ledgister the conference coordinator.
The full Ellington ’89 program can be read and downloaded here.
Bob Reny, who was part of the organizing committee, has generously shared his recollection of the preparation of the conference with the DESS website.
“To begin with, The Duke Ellington Society, Washington DC was a relatively small organization and we didn’t think we could mount a Conference recognizing Duke’s 90th Birthday in light of our few members and limited funds. But we began, chipping away at one obstacle after another, feeding off the material supplied by other Societies.
We had great cooperation from the Mayflower Hotel for the two day event.
The major challenge – the music – was solved when we engaged the Doug Richard’s Orchestra from Richmond, VA which had a solid reputation of playing Ellington’s music with unbridled passion. Then through the friendships of some of our key members with Ellington sidemen, we were able to secure the talents of vocalist Herb Jefferies and clarinetist Jimmy Hamilton and those two luminaries, supported by the Richard’s Orchestra, helped swell our paid reservations list.
We still, however, didn’t have the level of funding to complete the conference and an angel in the form of famed recording engineer, Jack Towers, a member of our Society, came to our rescue with a no interest loan. Jack, who was loved by all of us, passed in 2010 at age 96 but not before becoming an “audio magician” for restoring, remastering and producing jazz vintage recordings for a myriad of jazz labels world-wide. He will also be remembered always for his role in recording the Ellington Orchestra live at Fargo, North Dakota in 1940, an album that became a best seller and received a Grammy Award.
Another key contributor to our Conference was Washington’s jazz radio giant Felix Grant (WMAL & WDCU), who painstakingly unearthed the birth certificate of Ellington and then worked for fifteen years to have a commemorative plaque placed at his birth place, 2129 Ward Place, NW, Washington, DC which is now a bulk mail postal facility – the bronze plaque is mounted on the outside brick wall near the entrance.
Grant commented that “Ellington has been a name in music for about six decades of the century. The only other person I can say that is true of is Irving Berlin.” The plaque was unveiled by son Mercer Ellington on the birthday of his father in the afternoon of the second day of our Conference, April 29; the ceremony was well attended by conference participants.”
This far Bob Reny.
Doug Richard and his orchestra was not the only one performed Ellington music at the conference. Another one was the late Ellington scholar and author of the book “Ellington: The Early Years” Dr. Mark Tucker.
Replacing the originally announced orchestra “The Army Blues”, Tucker thrilled the conference participants, which had gathered for an evening reception at the Flag Hall of the National Museum of American History, with a concert with Ellington’s piano music.
The concert is also available as a soundfile in the Ellington Archive’s Washington D.C. 1989 folder
Smått och gott / Bits and Pieces
Ellington Study Group Conference May 25-27, 2018
Even if there is still no official announcement, it seems that the 25th Ellington Study Group Conference will take place in England or more precisely in Birmingham on May 25-27.
It is organized and hosted by the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire and the School of Media, Birmingham City University in association with Duke Ellington Society UK (DESUK).
The conference starts at 17 o’clock on May 27 and ends on 13 o’clock on May 29.
The programme includes two keynote presentations, six thematic panels with presentations and four concerts by the Birmingham Conservatoire’s Ellington Jazz Orchestra.
The keynote presentations will be given by Dr. Harvey Cohen, Senior Lecturer, Kings College London and Dr. Katherine Williams, Lecturer in Music, Plymouth College. Dr. Cohen is the author of “Duke Ellington’s America” and Dr. Williams is doing research for a new book on Duke Ellington.
The web editor has done some research on hotels in Birmingham not far from the site of the conference and the result can be found here.
Jazzy Poppins
In the beginning of January, Laurent Mignard and his Duke Orchestra presented a “spectacle musical” in Paris called Jazzy Poppins. The show is inspired by the musical Mary Poppins and Duke Ellington’s Reprise album “Duke Ellington Plays Mary Poppins”.
Another set of performances took place at the end of February and early March. Most likely, there will be even more.
Those, who do not live in Paris, can enjoy the show on CD. It can be ordered at the Laurant Mignard website http://www.laurent-mignard.com/jazzy-poppins-boutique/
On May 6 at 11 o’clock, the Duke Orchestra and the lead singer in the show, Sophie Kaufmann, will appear on the public radio station France Music (www. francemusique.fr) to perform a substantial part of the show.
Blue Light
In accordance with the agreement between the website and DESUK, issues 2015:4 and of Blue Light are now available to members of DESS in the Ellington article.
Especially interesting features in this issue is a report by DESUK’s late chairman Geoff Smith on the 2015 Ellington Study Group Conference in Portland, Oregon on Nov. 6-8, 2015, the first of two article by Matthew J. Cooper on Ellington as a pianist and a discussion between Roger Boyes and Geoff Smith on the Cambridge Companion to Duke Ellington published in 2015.
Smått och gott / Bits and Pieces
Next Ellington Study Group Conference
The next Ellington Study Group Conference will take place in Birmingham, England on 25-27 May 2018.
The conference is organized jointly by the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire and the Birmingham City University in cooperation with DESUK. The main conference venue will be the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire.
Details about the conference is in the announcement (attached) in the latest issue of DESUK’s Blue Light.
Member CDs
Maison du Duke has issued a new CD – “Mingus Chez Duke” – to the benefit of its members. It has 20 tracks from the appearance of the Duke Ellington orchestra at Bandbox in New York Jan. 30-Feb. 9, 1953. To get the CD, one only has to pay the 20 EUR membership fee plus 5 EUR to cover the postage. Follow this link http://maison-du-duke.com/espace-membres/adherer-2/ to learn how to do it.
With the new issue of Blue Light, also DESUK provides its members with a CD. It is a copy of the CD of Hurricane airshots from the Timme Rosenkrantz collection, which Frits Schjøtt put together for the benefit of the participants at the 2016 Ellington conference.
Ellington article
In its August 17, 2017 issue, The New Yorker published an Ellington article by the pianist and composer Ethan Iverson, which is highly recommended for reading.
It is titled “Duke Ellington, Bill Evans and A Night in New York” and can be found at this link:
It is also available to DESS members in the Ellington Archive.
Stockholm 1994 (5)
Here is some more from the Ellington ’94 conference in Stockholm.
One of the afternoon presentations on the second day was by Jan Bruér. He talked about “Duke Ellington in Sweden”.
Later in the afternoon on that day, Andrew Homzy talked about “Duke Ellington in the Avant Garde”.
In the morning of the last day of the conference, Alice Babs and Nils Lindberg sat down together to talk about “There Is Something About Me” – a composition which Ellington gave to Alice Babs on a cassette tape one day in New York and which she later recorded with Nils Lindberg.
Ellington ’94 (3)
After the lunch at the Stockholm Town Hall, the conference participants enjoyed, among others a presentation by the French jazz critic and record producer Alexandre Rado on his friend Cat Anderson, and to what Nils Lindberg, the Swedish jazz musician and composer, had to say about Dalecarlia and African influences in the orchestral arrangement he wrote for Duke and which was recorded as Far Away Star
The next morning, after having recovered from the gala concert at the Stockholm Concert Hall (where among others Clark Terry performed), they could listen to Klaus Stratemen talking about Ellington on film and showing some goodies from his archive.