Duke Ellington

Duke Ellington's Orchestra was a complex configuration of many spiritual and musical elements. To be sure, it was Duke Ellington's music which was created here; but it was just as much the music of each individual member of the band. Many Ellington pieces were genuine collective achievements, but it was Ellington who headed the collective. Attempts have been made to describe how Ellingron recordings came into being - but the process is so subtle that verbalization appears crude. Duke, or his alter ego, the late Billy Strayhorn, arranger and jazz composer, or one of the members of the band, would come to the studio with a theme. Ellington would play it on the piano. The rhythm section would fall in.
One or another of the horn men would pick it up. Baritone saxophonist Harry Carney might improvise a solo on it. The brass would make up a suitable background for him. And Ellington would sit at the piano and listen, gently accenting the harmonies - and suddenly he'd know: This is how the piece should sound and no other way ... in the real meaning of the word he improvised it into being.
Once, it is said, Paul Whiteman and Ferde Grofe, his arranger, went night after night to the club where Ellington was playing, because they wanted to assimilate some of Ellington's typical sounds. Finally they gave up: "You can't steal from him." No matter how memorable and melodic Ellington's popular melodies had become, they seemed to lose too much of their essence when not played by Ellington himself.

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