Quincy Jones's Morning Orange Juice - "Kind of Blue"[From the Archives with Additions]

 © -  Steven A. Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.

Kind of Blue has been on my mind a lot recently. Whatever the nature of the neurological or sensory impulse, occasionally I find the music of some Jazz recording playing in my head.

Most of the time, the music brought back in these memories is from LP's [vinyl] that I listened to often when Jazz first formed its youthful impression on me.

I popped the digital version of this classic Miles album in my CD player and while listening to it, I began a casual rereading Ashley Kahn's book on the making of Kind of Blue recording which included a review of it that I found tucked away in the dust jacket by Don Heckman writing for the LA Times on Sunday, March 30, 1997. 

I had a hunch about a missing aspect of what makes this record so astonishingly special and sure enough after doing further research there is no mention of it. The overall musicianship on display is considerable, I mean, a front-line of Miles Davis, John Coltrane and Cannonball Adderley; Bill Evans on piano and the legendary Paul Chambers on bass. 

But there are few kudos for the drummer Jimmy Cobb who was new to the group for this recording [replacing the legendary Philly Joe Jones who had become undependable because of personal problems].

Philly Joe was a very busy drummer; always filling in space.

Yet the moody, modal music on Kind of Blue would have been overwhelmed by Philly's very busy style and benefited immensely by Cobb's just-play-time-and-stay-out-of-the-way approach. Jimmy gave the music space and in so doing allowed it to breathe and come to life.

Also, Jimmy is using a 22" [it may have even been as large as 24" in diameter] K-Zildjan ride cymbal which had just come into vogue at that time and whose overtones just washed under the music to give it all a very melancholy sound, something which is part of the music's appeal.

I tried one of these large cymbals on a few occasions and you really had to keep up with it or it would eat you alive.

With the horn players all struggling to learn how to solo in a modal environment, a busy drummer like Philly Joe would have been an unwanted distraction. If there's one thing you need to play Jazz its concentration; Philly's drumming brought fire but it was not a platform over which you could reflect and think. He'd run over you if you'd stopped to do this.

No discredit to Philly but without Jimmy playing time on this big cymbal with its beautifully harmonic overtones washing over everything, the music on Kind of Blue wouldn't have had the same feel or sound to it. 

"Wynton Marsalis has commented in an interview he gave to Ben Sidran: "Harmony is not the key to our music. Harmony is used in motion. And motion is rhythm. And rhythm is the most important aspect. I mean everything is important. But whenever you find a valid rhythmic innovation, that changes the music. If you change the rhythm, you change the music."

Jimmy Cobb's style of drumming changed the rhythm on Kind of Blue and enhanced the impact its modal Jazz had on the listener.

In celebration of all of this subconscious revelation, the editorial staff at JazzProfiles thought it might be fun to re-post this excerpt from Ashley Kahn very fine book Kind of Blue: The Making of the Miles Davis Masterpiece.

© -  Steven A. Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.

“That will always be my music, man.
I play Kind of Blue every day – it’s my orange juice.
It still sounds like it was made yesterday.

Kind of Blue can be heard as a recapitulation of almost every step of the jazz tradition that preceded it."
-Quincy Jones, composer-arranger, musician, impresario

For many of us growing up listening to Jazz on records in the 1950s, the day we first heard the Kind of Blue album has no doubt been timed and dated somewhere in our memory bank of significant encounters with the music.

Returning to the music on this recording over the years has always been a satisfying experience and many of the reasons why this is so are described in Ashley Kahn’s Kind of Blue: The Making of the Miles Davis Masterpiece [New York: DaCapo Press, 2000].

As is the case with the classic recording which practically plays itself into one’s subconscious, Mr. Kahn’s work is a sensitive and unassuming narrative of how this phenomena of an album came together. He does an admirable job of capturing the circumstances that brought about a great work of art and presents this recounting in a manner that is both readable and interesting. This is not an academic “study,” but rather a well-written story of how a group of musicians gathered together on two fateful days in March and April 1959, respectively, to create a masterpiece.

What follows is Mr. Kahn’s Introduction to his work in which he details his considerable efforts at research, interviews and editing in order to bring the reader as many fresh insights into the making of the album as possible. 


“ON A DECEMBER MORNING in 1999, millennium mania and snowflakes swirled about me as I entered a squat, near‑windowless building on Tenth Avenue. The awning outside read "Sony Music Studios." Inside, down a dimly lit corridor lined with posters of rock and rap artists, thick doors with porthole windows led into fully furnished studios, where large consoles with matrices of red and white lights stood next to racks full of the latest sound equipment. People lost in concentration scurried past me.

The few times I had visited the place before, I had felt the same way: This hi‑tech beehive, a monument to Sony's global technological superiority, seemed somehow transitory. I felt that a careless flip of a switch could plunge the entire place into darkness. Maybe it was the signs of constant renova­tions‑plastic sheeting covering doorways‑that created the feeling of imper­manence, or perhaps it was the rotation of posters from one visit to the next. It didn't surprise me to learn that Sony Music had built their recording center in the remains of the old Twentieth Century‑Fox Movietone reposi­tory. Where dusty film canisters had once stored a week‑by‑week chronicle of the world's troubles and triumphs, four stories of state‑of‑the art studios now operated: new technology rising phoenix‑like from the vestiges of old.

Four months earlier, for The New York Times, I had written an appreciation of Miles Davis's melancholy masterpiece Kind of Blue on the fortieth anniversary of its release. Now I had been granted a rare opportunity to hear the complete master tapes of the two sessions that produced the album. Sony Music‑the parent company of Columbia Records, which released Kind of Blue and remained Miles's record label for the majority of his career ­did not often send to their subterranean archives in upstate New York and allow the reel‑to‑reel tapes to be auditioned. When dealing with priceless and irreplaceable forty‑year‑old recordings, even the wear on the tape is a consid­eration. For a jazz fan like me, the occasion had the rarified, historic air of, say, the unearthing of an Egyptian tomb.

The receptionist directed me to room 305. Equipment dedicated to sound reproduction, including a turntable in a stone base with a speed lever reading "78 rpm," filled the room. Sitting amid the machines, scattered tape reels, vinyl records of varying formats, and general clutter was an engineer trained in audio formats new, old and ancient. In this room, I was convinced, whatever means of capturing audio information have ever existed‑wax cylinders to the latest computer‑driven, digital discs‑all came back to life.

Delicately, the engineer placed a reel of reddish‑brown, half‑inch ribbon onto a tape machine, manufactured expressly to play back archival three­-track tapes. He paused, asked if I was ready. (Ready? I had been giddy with anticipation for weeks.) He hit the "play" button.

The tape threaded its way across the playback heads and I heard the voices of Miles Davis and his producer, Irving Townsend, the instantly recognizable sound of Miles's trumpet, John Coltrane's tenor, Cannonball Adderley's alto and the other musicians. I listened to their harmonized riffs start and stop and grew acclimated to the rhythm of the recording process. A few engineers who had heard that the masters were being played that day dropped by and quietly pulled up chairs or stood in the corner to listen.

What could I hear or intuit that would reveal the secret of that spring day when Davis assembled his famed sextet (Coltrane, Adderley, Bill Evans, Paul Chambers and Jimmy Cobb with pianist Wynton Kelly taking over from Evans on one number) in a converted church in downtown Manhattan? I was flooded with questions, hungry for details. How did this band talk while creating music for the ages? Was that Coltrane's voice or Adderley's? How - ­if at all ‑ did they prepare? What was Miles like in the studio? Why did that take end? I had learned that the three master reels, the few rolls of black-­and‑white film, and the less‑than‑distinct memories of the drummer, a photographer, and a tape operator who were in the East Thirtieth Street studio on that day back in 1959 were about all the evidence there was of the making of the album. The dearth of related material only heightened the album's mystique and intensified my desire to uncover anything that might throw light on what seemed such a shadowy, skeletal moment.

As the first full take of "Freddie Freeloader" began playing, I put down my pen and focused on the music. By the time Coltrane began soloing, I was transported to an austere twilight world that requested silence and contem­plation. I was familiar with the album from years of dedicated listening but the music's seductive spell had not lessened‑it still held the power to quiet all around it.

Still acknowledged as the height of hip four decades after it was recorded, Kind of Blue is the premier album of its era, jazz or otherwise. Its vapory piano‑and‑bass introduction is universally recognized. Classical buffs and rage rockers alike praise its subtlety, simplicity and emotional depth. Copies of the album are passed to friends and given to lovers. The album has sold millions of copies around the world, making it the best‑selling recording in Miles Davis's catalog and the best‑selling classic jazz album ever. Signifi­cantly, a large number of those copies were purchased in the past five years, and undoubtedly not just by old‑timers replacing worn vinyl: Kind of Blue is self‑perpetuating, continuing to cast its spell on a younger audience more accustomed to the loud‑and‑fast esthetic of rock and rap.


The album’s appeal was certainly enhanced by Miles’ personal mystique. Cool, well-dressed, endlessly inspired, and uncompromising in art and life, Davis was and still is a hero to jazz fans, African Americans and an interna­tional musical community. "Miles Davis is my definition of cool," Bob Dylan has said. "I loved to see him in the small clubs playing his solo, turn his back on the crowd, put down his horn and walk off the stage, let the band keep playing, and then come back and play a few notes at the end."

Since his death in 1991, Davis's legend has only grown larger. But even before his passing, Kind of Blue was the recording that a vast majority called his defining masterwork. If someone has only one Miles album‑or even only one jazz recording‑more often than not, Kind of Blue is it. Even twenty‑five

 years ago, as jazz guitarist John Scofield relates, the album had already become as common as a cup of sugar:



I remember at Berklee School [of Music in Boston) in the early seventies, hanging out at this bass player's apartment and they didn't have Kind of Blue. So at two in the morning he said he'd just go to the neighbor's and ask for their copy, not knowing the people, assuming that they'd have it! And they did. It was like Sergeant Pepper.

In the church of jazz, Kind of Blue is one of the holy relics. Critics revere it as a stylistic milestone, one of a very few in the long tradition of jazz performance, on equal footing with seminal recordings by Louis Armstrong's Hot Fives and Charlie Parker's bebop quintets. Musicians acknowledge its influence and have recorded hundreds of versions of the music on the album. Record producer, composer, and Davis confidant Quincy Jones hails it as the one album (if that were the limit) that would explain jazz.

Yet, Kind of Blue lives and prospers outside the confines of the jazz community. No longer the exclusive possession of a musical subculture, the album is simply great music, one of a very, very few musical recordings our culture allows into the category marked "masterpiece." Many of its admirers are forced to reach back before the modern era to find its measure. Drummer Elvin Jones hears the same timeless sublimity and depth of feeling "in some of the movements of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, or when I hear Pablo Casals play unaccompanied cello." "It's like listening to Tosca," says pianist/ singer Shirley Horn. "You know, you always cry, or at least I do."


In the fin‑de‑siecle frenzy, Kind of Blue proved its evergreen appeal, becoming a fixture in the first tier of countless "Best of the Century" surveys and "Top 100" polls. Hollywood film in the nineties employed the album as an instant signifier of hip. In the Line of Fire shows secret serviceman Clint Eastwood, the cool loner at home, listening to "All Blues." In Pleasantville, a group of fifties high‑schoolers are intellectually awakened to the tune of "So What." In Runaway Bride, Julia Roberts's character bestows an original vinyl copy of Kind of Blue on Richard Gere.

As I began the research for this book, Sony Music was in the midst of producing high‑quality repackaging of Miles's recordings and of jazz in general, a fortunate change from the offhand reissue strategy of previous decades. They graciously provided me complete access to all information, photographs and recordings in their archives, and facilitated contact with former employees. I located session and tape logs that disclosed the identity of the recording staff who worked on Kind of Blue, most of whom‑like the members of the sextet save for drummer Jimmy Cobb‑are no longer with us. My conversations with Columbia engineers of that era painted a picture of what it was like to work in the 3oth Street Studio, the former church where the album was born. Sifting through company files, I glimpsed the inner workings of the marketing and promotion departments which first brought Kind of Blue to market.

To bring the reader as near as possible to the actual creation of the album, I have placed the transcription and discussion of the record sessions at the heart of the book. The unedited studio dialogue, false starts and break­downs‑herein reproduced for the first time‑offer a rare glimpse of the inner workings of those two days in the studio. The transcribed chatter alone, revealing Cannonball Adderley's irrepressible sense of humor and Miles's constant ribbing of his producer, will delight those who love the music that occasioned it.


I stumbled on a number of surprises in my research. There were Bill Evans's original liner notes, neatly handwritten and hardly edited. Engineer Fred Plaut's photographs, never published before now, showing the sheet music for a tune's modal infrastructure. Proof that the famously dark and intense cover shot of Miles was taken during a live performance at the Apollo Theater. Never‑before‑published radio conversations with Adderley and Evans in which they spoke of Miles and the album in detail, conveying a personal dimension lacking from previously published interviews.

Beyond the new information my research yielded about Kind of Blue, I was equally drawn by the more mystical aspects of the album. The legend of its pure, one‑take creation. The alchemic blending of classical and folk music influences. The interplay of Miles's less‑is‑more philosophy with the styles of the equally spare Bill Evans and his other, more voluble sidemen. The drama of Davis driven by an endless search for new styles creating a masterwork, then leaving it behind for his next endeavor. I was challenged to examine what is true in the mythology of the recording. Was the album really impromptu and unplanned? Did Miles really compose all the music? Did it change the jazz terrain forever, and if so, how?

To do the album justice, I needed to transport myself back to the place and time that brought it forth. I spoke with as many musicians, producers, and critics as possible‑those who were involved in making the album, were influenced by the music, or who analyzed its effects. Eventually I conducted more than fifty interviews for this book, including talks with veteran jazzmen who knew or worked with Miles, newer arrivals who grew up with his music, producers, music industry executives, deejays, writers, and witnesses of the jazz scene of the 1950s. Priority was given to the people still alive who were present at the two Kind of Blue recording sessions: drummer Jimmy Cobb, photographer Don Hunstein, and tape operator Bob Waller. I found that though a few musicians and producers were reluctant to speak, burned out on the subject of Miles or simply burned by the trumpeter in uncompli­mentary portrayals in interviews or in his autobiography, many were eager to share their memories and insights. I gave special attention to those who worked with Miles in and around 1959, or soon after: Jimmy Heath, Dave Brubeck, George Russell, John Lewis, Joe Zawinul and Herbie Hancock; producers George Avakian and Teo Macero; and engineer Frank Laico.

Some saw Kind of Blue as the sound of 1950s New York; some as a high point in Miles's career trajectory; others as one more successful product of a record label at the height of its dominance. As the anecdotes coalesced, the structure for the book that suggested itself was a reverse telescopic path­ - beginning with Miles's arrival in New York, then following his career course before closing in, take‑by‑take, on the album's two recording sessions. From there, the book moves outward again to trace the album's influence. Side­bars add further context: Columbia Records' rise to prominence and its role in the success of Kind of Blue; the unique acoustical properties that made music recorded at the 30th Street Studio distinctive; the eponymous Freddie Freeloader.

When I spoke of writing this celebration of Kind of Blue, whether to music
professionals or to fans, reaction was uniformly positive: "You know, that's a good idea"; "Let's hear more about that album"; "It's about time." Then after a pause, with little or no solicitation, a testimonial would follow.

QUINCY JONES: "That will always be my music, man.
I play Kind of Blue every day‑it's my orange juice. It still sounds like it was made yesterday."

CHICK COREA: "It's one thing to just play a tune, or play a program of music, but it's another thing to practically create a new language of music, which is what Kind of Blue did."

GEORGE RUSSELL: "Kind of Blue is just one of those amazing albums that emerged from that period of time. Miles's solo on 'So What' is one of the most beautiful solos ever."

With the clarity of memory usually reserved for national disasters, personal traumas, or first romantic encounters, many I interviewed recalled their first hearing of Kind of Blue. Some encountered the music when it first appeared in 1959: on a late‑night radio station in Cleveland; in a Wisconsin furniture store selling records; live in a New York nightclub or at an outdoor festival in Toronto; on a jukebox in a Harlem watering hole. Others came across it in the sixties: among the mono LPs a friendly salesclerk with a flowered tie was selling off at a dollar a disc; playing at a late‑night party down in Greenwich Village. One acquaintance admitted hearing Kind of Blue in a college class on Zen.

Kind of Blue's aphrodisiac properties were mentioned frequently in reminiscences of listeners male and female, young and not‑so‑young. Jazz veteran Ben Sidran recalls that "clearly it was just a great seduction record. I can close my eyes and remember situations with long forgotten girls." Anthony Kiedis of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, when asked for his favorite make‑out music, answered, "For slow action, I put on Kind of Blue." Because of "the trance‑like atmosphere that it created, it's like sexual wallpaper. It was sort of the Barry White of its time," remembers Steely Dan's Donald Fagen. Essayist/playwright Pearl Cleage was turned on to the album in the late seventies: "I will confess that I spent many memorable evenings sending messages of great personal passion through the intricate improvisa­tions of Kind of Blue when blue was the furthest thing from my mind. . . . "

My own discovery of the music came in the mid‑seventies, when a high­ school buddy yanked a dog-eared album out of my father's record collection and explained: "This is a classic." Between the scratches and pops (Dad must play this one a lot, I recall thinking) a stark, moody world unveiled itself. Though the sound was far simpler and sadder than any of the peppy, big band music I then thought of as jazz, it was somehow immediately familiar.

If you are already a fan of the album, perhaps a "first time" story of your own comes to mind. Or ask the friend who turned you on to Kind of Blue. Bring that memory with you to the world we're about to enter. Use this book as a primer, a listening guide, a way to understand that there is even more to these forty minutes of great jazz performance than meets the ear. Allow this book to show you that occasionally that which is the least outspoken has the most to say.”

Jazz Interpretations of Porgy and Bess Companion Marketing Announcement

 

A Companion to Jazz Interpretations of Porgy and Bess is now available as a paperback and eBook exclusively through Amazon.com. Just enter my name in the search box under “Books.” With so much of this music now available on YouTube you’ll be able to listen to the music while you read the commentaries.

Here are the details:

A Prologue, Preface, Introduction and Epilogue plus 32 chapters by a variety of Jazz authors documenting Jazz interpretations of the folk-opera Porgy and Bess, one of America’s great cultural achievements, including those by Bethlehem Records, Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong, Gil Evans and Miles Davis, Bob Crosby, Oscar Peterson’s Trio, Oscar Peterson and Joe Pass, Hank Jones, Paolo Fresu, Diahann Carroll, The Jim Cullum Band, Rex Stewart and Cootie Williams, Ralph Burns, Mundell Lowe, Joe Henderson, The Modern Jazz Quartet, Bill Potts, Clark Terry, Nueva Manteca, Eddy Louiss, Phil Woods, Buddy Collette, Sammy Davis Jr. and Carmen McRae, Harry Belafonte and Lena Horne.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Prologue by Hollis Alpert, pp. 8-14

Preface - The Embryonic Beginnings and Flavor of the Times by Hollis Alpert, pp. 15-37

Introduction to A Companion of Jazz Interpretations of Porgy and Bess - Steven A. Cerra, pp. 38-43

Chapter 1. The Bethlehem Records Release of George Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess by J.F. Quinn, Joseph Laredo and Art Hilgart, pp. 44-70 

Chapter 2. Porgy and Bess - Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong - Lawrence D. Stewart, pp. 71-97 

Chapter 3. Ella and Louis and Porgy and Bess by Ricky Riccardi, pp. 98-101

Chapter 4. Miles, Gil, and Porgy and Bess - In the Jazz Literature - Steven A. Cerra, Editor, 102-106

Chapter 5. Miles and Porgy and Bess - Jack Chambers, pp. 107-113

Chapter 6. Gil Evans and Porgy and Bess - Gene Lees and Charles Edward Smith, pp. 114-124

Chapter 7. Gil Evans and Porgy and Bess - Stephanie Crease, pp. 125-132

Chapter 8. Porgy and Bess: Ray Charles, and Cleo Lane (1976) by Benny Green, pp. 133-147

Chapter 9. Summertime - Norman Granz and Ted Gioia, pp. 148-152

Chapter 10. Duke Ellington with Edward R. Murrow on Gershwin's Porgy and Bess—and a Response from the Office of Irving Mills (1935/1936), pp. 153-161

Chapter 11. 1959 Bob Crosby “Porgy and Bess As Gershwin Would Have Liked It” by Nelson Riddle, pp. 162-165

Chapter 12. Oscar Peterson and Joe Pass Play Porgy and Bess Notes by Benny Green, pp. 166-169

Chapter 13. Porgy and Bess Swingin' Impressions by Hank Jones - by Edward Jablonski, pp. 170-173

Chapter 14. Paolo Fresu and the Jazz Orchestra of Sardinia - Porgy and Bess by Marcello Piras and Paolo Fresu, pp. 174-179

Chapter 15. Diahann Carroll and the André  Previn Trio - Porgy and Bess by Edward Jablonski, pp. 180-186

Chapter 16. The Jim Cullum Jazz Band - An Original Transcription of Porgy and Bess, pp. 187-192

Chapter 17. “Porgy and Bess Revisited Stewart-Williams & Co." - George T. Simon, pp. 193-199

Chapter 18. Ralph Burns - Porgy and Bess by Burt Korall, pp. 200-208

Chapter 19. Gershwin’s PORGY AND BESS by the Mundell Lowe All-Stars - Frank Talmadge, pp. 209-214

Chapter 20. Joe Henderson’s PORGY AND BESS - A Review of the Jazz Literature - Steven A. Cerra, Editor, pp. 215-220

Chapter 21. The Modern Jazz Quartet Plays George Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess - Joel Dorn, Ira Gitler and John Tynan, pp. 221-230

Chapter 22. Bill Potts - The Jazz Soul Of Porgy And Bess  by André Previn and Steve Wallace, pp. 231-253

Chapter 23. Clark Terry with the Chicago Jazz Orchestra - Porgy & Bess - Steve Graybow, pp. 254-258

Chapter 24. Oscar Peterson Plays Porgy & Bess by Lawrence D. Stewart and Benny Green, pp. 259-264

Chapter 25. Nueva Manteca Porgy and Bess -  Jan Laurens Hartong, pp. 265-268

Chapter 26. Eddy Louiss, Ivan Jullien and PORGY & BESS - Alain Tercinet, pp. 269-272 

Chapter 27. Porgy and Bess - The Jazz Class Orchestra Meets Phil Woods - Vittoria Franchini and Gabriele Comeglio, pp. 273-277

Chapter 28. Paolo Fresu – Kind Of Porgy & Bess, 278-280

Chapter 29. Buddy Collette and the Poll Winners - Modern Interpretations of Porgy and Bess - John Tynan, pp. 281-285

Chapter 30. Sammy Davis, Jr. and Carmen McRae - Porgy and Bess - Wil Haygood, pp. 286-294

Chapter 31. Lena Horne and Harry Belafonte Sings Porgy and Bess by George Durham, 295-298

Chapter 32. Akiyoshi, Bailey, Hanna, Mraz and Rosengren - Not a Law Firm! - Steven A. Cerra, pp. 299-301

Epilogue -Porgy and Bess - Some Considerations and Reviews Excerpted from Gershwin Biographies, pp. 302-317

Winner of the 2025 Jazz Journalist Association Special Citation for Historic Writings, Steven Cerra is a professional Jazz drummer and the author of anthologies on Gerry Mulligan, Bill Evans, Stan Kenton, Dave Brubeck, Shelly Manne, Jazz West Coast Readers Vols. 1-3, Profiles in Jazz, Vol.1, Jazz Drummers A Reader Vols. 1-2, Jazz Saxophonists A Reader, Vol. 1, 2 & 3, Jazz Piano A Reader, Vols. 1, 2 & 3, Jazz Trumpet A Reader Vols. 1 and 2 and A Companion Celebrating The 100th Anniversary of the Jean Goldkette Orchestras, 1926-2026. He also hosts the jazzprofiles.blogspot and cerra.substack blogs.

Ray Pizzi – Conception (Full Album) [ Jazz / Post Bop / Jazz-Rock / Fusion ][1977]

 

Tracklist: A1 Ray Pizzi - Conception 00:00 A2 Ray Pizzi - Willow Creek 05:23 A3 Ray Pizzi - The Missing Link 10:44 B1 Ray Pizzi - Angel's Crest 18:03 B2 Ray Pizzi - Friday Night Rush Hour Blues 22:49 B3 Ray Pizzi - Rhapsodie 26:53 B4 Ray Pizzi - Digitations 31:27 Credits Acoustic Bass – John Heard (tracks: B1 to B4) Artwork By [Layout & Design] – Norman Granz, Sheldon Marks Drums – Peter Donald Electric Bass – Joel Di Bartolo Engineer – Buddy Brundo Guitar – Dan Sawyer, John Morell Percussion – Mark Stevens (tracks: A1 to A3) Photography – Phil Stern Piano [Solo] – Mark Levine (tracks: B1 to B4) Piano, Organ, Keyboards – Greg Mathieson Saxophone [Tenor, Soprano], Flute, Bassoon, Producer, Composed By, Arranged By – Ray Pizzi Website: https://intrinse.net/

Double Play: Harry Carney and Johnny Hodges Interviewed by Don DeMichael [1962]

 © Copyright ® Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.

By 1962, when the following article by Don DeMichael appeared in Downbeat  (7 June 1962, 20-21, 44), saxophonists Harry Carney (1910-1974) and Johnny Hodges (1907-1970) had been key figures with Ellington for three and a half decades. Carney officially joined Ellington's band in 1927 (though he may have played in it occasionally the preceding year in New England), while Hodges became a full-time member in 1928.

As DeMichael's piece revealed. Carney and Hodges shared more than their long experience together in the Ellington reed section. Both hailed from Massachusetts (Carney from Boston, Hodges from Cambridge), came under the influence of Sidney Bechet early on, and spoke of their experience as Ellingtonians with a mixture of cool professionalism, obvious pride, and unabashed awe for their leader's abilities.

“It's hard to keep track of some jazzmen. One week they're with so-and-so's band, the next week with a different group. It seems they change jobs as easily as they change clothes —and sometimes as often. But when a man joins the Ellington band, he usually stays.

Take the two senior members of the band. Harry Carney has been with the band since he was 17, and that was 36 years ago. Johnny Hodges, except from 1951-55, has been an Ellingtonian since 1928. So strong has been the association of men and band that Hodges' flowing, sensuous alto and Carney's full-blooded baritone are as much a part of the "Ellington sound" as are plunger-muted brass and Duke's piano.

But the Hodges-Carney relationship extends beyond their careers in the Ellington band. Both are from the Boston, Mass., area, and though Hodges is four years older than Carney, they were boyhood chums.

"Johnny and I lived a few doors apart," Carney said recently. "We used to get together and listen to records. And, of course, I've always been a great admirer of Johnny. I was trying to play alto in the same vein, and I stuck as close to him as he would allow me. It did me an awful lot of good."

Carney, a large man, sat quietly on the edge of a hotel-room bed. Hodges, a small man, sprawled on the bed, watching the flickering picture of a silent television set. He chuckled occasionally. It was difficult to tell if he was amused by the TV show or by Carney's reminiscences of far-away days.

Carney continued: "Hodges was in New York before I came there. He was instrumental in getting me my first job in New York. That was in 1927.

"He was with Chick Webb at the Savoy Ballroom. They were having what they called a Masquerade Ball Night, an all-day, all-night affair. Instead of the regular two bands playing, there were four bands. Johnny got me a job in one of the relief bands. In the band was a fellow, Henry Saytoe [Henri Saparo], who had a job coming up in a couple of weeks at the Bamboo Inn, a Chinese-American restaurant. I got permission from my folks to stay, and I took that job. I was 17."

Hodges chuckled again.

While Carney was at the Bamboo Inn, Ellington often came in on his nights off to dine and listen to the band. After Carney had been at the restaurant for about three months, the place burned down.

But he evidently had made an impression on Ellington.

"One day I bumped into Duke on the street," Carney said. "He inquired as to what I was doing. I told him I was jobbing around, gigging. That's when he made me the offer to join him. He was taking a band up to New England, which was my stomping ground. I'd been away from home long enough to be homesick, and it didn't take much for him to influence me to go back."

Still an altoist, Carney added baritone saxophone to his doubles during his first week with the band.

"There were quite a few good baritone players in those days," he said. "Sonny Adams, Willie Grant, Joe Garland, Foots Thomas with the Missourians. As a matter of fact, all the bands used baritone if the band was above a certain number of pieces. The average nine- or 10-piece band would have baritone or someone who doubled baritone. I continued with alto, though, to about '32 or maybe later than that."

Hodges, who speaks much the same way he plays, stirred when asked how he joined the band.

"I'd been with Chick Webb," he said, "You see, Duke started Chick, gave Chick his first band. Duke was working at the Kentucky Club, six pieces. Another club opened up on 50th St. and Seventh Ave. I don't remember the name of it. But it wanted a band just like Duke's. So he asked me to have a band, and I didn't want any part of having a band. He asked Chick. (Chick would stand on a corner and sing whole arrangements.} We got together with six pieces and tried to make it sound like Duke. We did pretty good until we had a fire. During that time fire was common in clubs. We went up to the Savoy for two weeks. Stayed about six months.

"I left and started gigging with a fellow named Luckey Roberts. The bread was good. Thought it would last forever. So I kept gigging and gigging and

gigging-

"Meanwhile, Otto Hardwicke [who was playing alto with Ellington] had

an accident went through the windshield of a taxicab. Had his face all cut up, and I had to go to work for him. Duke offered me a job. I still wouldn't take the job, kept putting it off and putting it off. Everybody was trying to talk me into taking it. So I finally took it. And here I am."

Hodges would have it that nothing much happened between then and now. He fails to mention that in those years he became one of the important alto saxophonists, that his manner of playing influenced countless musicians. He will mention in an off-hand manner the small band he led from 1951-55 ("a little experience of my own, a few knocks, a few headaches").

But Hodges comments freely when the topic of discussion turns to Sidney Bechet (pronounced "Bash-shay" by those who knew the late soprano saxophonist well).

"I went to hear him at a theater in Boston," Hodges said. "My sister knew him very well. Made myself known, and had a little soprano under my arm. He asked me to play. I caught the show two, three times to catch as much as I could. And then I started buying records. Him and Louis Armstrong. The Clarence Williams Blue Five.

"The best thing that ever happened to me was when I went to New York and was playing at a little cabaret on 135th St. He came after me. He had a club of his own called Club Bechet on 145th St. He came after me and offered

me a job. He would tell me to learn this and learn that. The old man won't be here long,' he'd say. I didn't know what he was talking about then, but he would go away and get lost, and I was supposed to play his part. At the same time, I was learning, getting an education.

"They used to have midnight shows at the Lafayette Theater every Friday. All the clubs used to put on their shows for free. Fantastic. We put on our show, and that's how I got to be known, through him. We played I Found a New Baby in duet form. So I was a big guy from then on, playing a duet with Bechet.

"That was way before Carney. I was 17. I used to come to New York and stay a week and run back. I'd take a job in a dancing school that would pay about $40 a week and only draw $8 or $10, just enough to go home. Day before payday, I'd go home, and we'd sit down and compare notes. Me, him [Carney], and Charlie Holmes [a saxophonist prominent in the late '20s and '30s, especially during his stay with the Luis Russell Band when it was fronted by Louis Armstrong]. Go back next week and do the same thing."

Carney, too, came under Bechet's influence.

"It was through Johnny that I became Bechet-conscious," he said. "That was before I left Boston. After I got with Duke, I heard so many fabulous stories about Bechet. Finally I met him and found he was a wonderful guy, very humorous, dry."

But it was Hodges who absorbed Bechet into his playing. For example, Hodges' alto solo on his small-band recording of Dream Blues, made in 1939 and reissued last year on an Epic LP, if played at 45 rpm instead of 33 rpm sounds like Bechet's soprano.

"I had quite a few of his riffs," Hodges said, smiling. "Quite a few of his pets. My pets too. Used to nurse him."

Hodges turned to Carney, the conversation about Ellington small-unit recordings seemingly having reminded him of something.

"You know those test records they used to give us?" he asked Carney. "I got all those. Jeep's Blues. You remember when you, me, and Cootie were getting it together?"

Carney nodded.

"I got all those," Hodges said. "They'd do four or five takes and keep one or two. And one or two of what they didn't use would be better than what they put out."

The mention of trumpeter Cootie Williams, who was a mainstay of the Ellington band from 1929 to 1940 when he left to go with Benny Goodman, brought to mind the Ellington band of the late '30s and early '40s, considered by many to be the golden era of the band.

But Carney would have none of this the-1940-band-was-the-best-band.

"A lot of people come up and start talking about the 1940 band and say, 'Gee, that was the band.' For the most part, they've stopped going where the band's playing. Then they come out one night and say, 'Oh, this band is nothing like the band of 1940.' And they actually haven't heard enough or absorbed enough of the current band's playing to say that. In 1940 there was something that did something to them, and that's all they remember."

Carney's point was well taken. Ellington, through both his music and the band, has evolved. For example, the band's library has several arrangements of Ellington tunes that have become standard.

"Take It Don't Mean a Thing" Hodges said. "I used to play the verse. You never heard the verse, didcha? That's the original. Then Ivie Anderson came in, and there was another arrangement. Then they had one for Ben Webster. And one for the brass section. Had one for Ray Nance. Then another one for Ray Nance, a different one."

"Rosemary Clooney did one," Carney added.

"We got all those," Hodges said. "We got a million of 'em. And they're all in the book."

"The book is jammed," Carney said. "We just carry them all over the country."

"And don't even mention the arrangements for Caravan," Hodges sputtered.

Nor is the library numbered, which, to say the least, makes finding a seldom-played arrangement difficult.

"He's very unpredictable," Carney said, referring to Ellington. "If someone comes up and asks for something, he'll have everyone digging through the book looking for it. Sometimes we find it, sometimes we don't."

In addition to carrying a large library filled with yesterday, the band carries a spirit and tradition that began the day before yesterday. Spirit and tradition are strong.

One of these traditions, an Ellington sound, is the plunger-growl trumpet, a tradition that started with Bubber Miley, was inherited by Cootie Williams, and continues, to a great extent, in the playing of Ray Nance.

"If Duke finds an individual who can do it," Carney commented, "he gives him the work to do. It must be gratifying to a player to know he plays enough to satisfy the Duke in this particular style.

"I can say the same thing about Russell Procope playing clarinet. When he plays clarinet, he plays Barney [Bigard] so well."

Commenting on the spirit of the band, Carney said, "There're a lot of nights when . .. everybody can't feel well all the time. But if the band gets something going, the spirit just comes up."

The tradition of the band members adding to, making suggestions about, arrangements is well known. It also is indicative of the band's spirit.

"For instance," Carney began, "when you go into a recording studio, you might have an arrangement all made, yet it'll probably be changed. Guys come up with ideas of injecting something. That still goes on."

"Everybody pitches in  — all the time," Hodges interjected. "Somebody might have ideas to make it a little better."

"In other words," Carney said, "everybody is still conscious of making a good record."

Spirit. Tradition. Both are contagious. Both are magnets, drawing new blood into the band but blood that is Ellington blood. For the band has always been made up of musicians best described as "Ellington people." When they leave the band, if they ever do, that special sheen of Ellington usually remains.

It is made up, in part, of suavity, urbanity, self-confidence. It is something no other band imparts to its members. It is a unique attractive-force.

Perhaps Carney said it best: "You still hear musicians say the height of their ambition is to play in the Ellington band."”

Winner of the 2025 Jazz Journalist Association Special Citation for Historic Writings, Steven Cerra is a professional Jazz drummer and the author of anthologies on Gerry Mulligan, Bill Evans, Stan Kenton, Dave Brubeck, Shelly Manne, Jazz West Coast Readers Vols. 1-3, Profiles in Jazz, Vol.1, Jazz Drummers A Reader Vols. 1-2, Jazz Saxophonists A Reader, Vol. 1, 2 & 3, Jazz Piano A Reader, Vols. 1, 2 & 3, Jazz Trumpet A Reader Vols. 1 and 2 and A Companion Celebrating The 100th Anniversary of the Jean Goldkette Orchestras, 1926-2026. He also hosts the jazzprofiles.blogspot and cerra.substack blogs.

Duke Ellington: The Making of New Orleans Suite by Steve Siegel

 © Introduction Copyright ® Steven Cerra, copyright protected; all rights reserved.

With previous features on pianist Wade Legge, the Great Day in Harlem Photograph “Mystery Man” - William J. Crump, drummer Frankie Dunlop, vocalist Jimmy Rushing, critic and author Nat Hentoff, and Jazz Party: A Great Night In Manhattan featuring the Miles Davis Sextet, bassist Doug Watkins, pianist Sonny Clark, the Duke Ellington Orchestra, the September 9, 1958 fest that Columbia Records put on at the Plaza Hotel for its executives and guests, trumpeter Dupree Bolton, vocalist Helen Merrill, and Bob Weinstock and the Prestige All-Star Sessions over the years, Steve Siegel has assumed the role of “unofficial” staff writer for JazzProfiles.

© -Steve Siegel copyright protected; all rights reserved; used with the author’s permission.

Duke Ellington: The Making of New Orleans Suite

By Steve Siegel

“Duke Ellington was never offered a formal academic appointment at any institute of higher education. But if he had been offered one it could possibly create a dilemma for the university's august administrators, that being, what academic area would Ellington be most suited for.

 If members of the faculty search committee had focused just upon the names of the many suites that Ellington wrote (as opposed to actually hearing the recordings), such as the Far East Suite, The Afro-Eurasian Suite, or the Latin American Suite,  they would quite possibly concur that Ellington must have studied the indigenous folk music of these regions and that his strengths might lie in the area of ethnomusicology and assign him courses accordingly.

But if Ellington's esteemed future colleagues had actually taken the time to gather around a turntable and spin a few of the records of these suites, it would become quite clear to them that very little, if any, of the indigenous music of those regions was actually contained within them. 

Therefore his appointment would be on hold until a suitable academic unit could be found that properly utilizes the would-be professor Ellington's many other strengths. 

The confusion over the content of the suites lies in the fact that Ellington conceptualized and wrote many of these suites more from the perspective of a sociologist than he did as one studying the formal musical structure of the region. Ellington’s suites took an impressionistic view of the regions he visited and not one based upon their native traditions. The academics would soon discover that much of Ellington's suite music reflected Ellington's worldview and might characterize him as a “rooted cosmopolitan” – a citizen of the world who, in Ellington's case, borrowed musical ideas from many disparate cultures.   

When it came to writing music evocative of the people, their culture and their music, Ellington filtered all he heard through his personal experiences and what he wrote was not necessarily solely based upon the music he encountered while in those countries. It was based primarily on an amalgamation of the locals’ customs and habits, sounds (both ambient and musical) that he heard, perhaps even the unique speech patterns of the languages he encountered. One only has to listen to the records produced, such as the aforementioned Latin-American Suite, Far East Suite, Afro-Eurasian Suite and a few others of the over 20 suites that he wrote, to perceive the consistency of his rather unique approach.

Ellington on the Far East Suite:

 I hope much of this will go into (the) music… but doing a parallel to the East has its problems. From my perspective, I think I have to be careful not to be influenced too strongly by the music we heard because there is a great sameness about it, beginning in the Arabic countries and going through India all the way to Ceylon.

Therefore, Ellington was more interested in transferring his impressions of the cultural touchstones he encountered, may they be of people’s experiences, the places they populate or possessions they possess - all that serves to define the region they inhabit, as he saw it - into his musical palette.

To prove the point it might be an interesting experiment to take all of the individual compositions from, say, the Latin American Suite and from the Far East Suite and play them back for the casual listener and ask them to place each piece under the correct suite.

That exercise would probably yield a result of randomness, but that's beside the point. Ellington’s best suites are well respected within his canon simply because most of the individual pieces can stand alone as examples of Ellington at his musical best. 

Ellington:

 The minute you become academic about it, you are going to fall into the trap of copying many other people who have tried to give a reflection of the music.

This quote is consistent with Ellington's mindset of never being satisfied with simply expanding on the musical work of others, but creating something totally fresh and unique. Therefore, Ellington was not just a musician but also a master storyteller as well as an impressionistic “painter” of sound.

Not all of the many suites that Ellington wrote were impressionistic in form. There were a few that actually were highly descriptive of  place and time. A listener’s ability to identify the suites by Ellington that were descriptive and less impressionistic is wholly dependent on how a listener might personally interpret what they hear in the music or what thoughts and emotions are evoked. But three suites that might stand out as rather literal interpretations of the subject matter at hand are: A Tone Parallel to Harlem, (1959); Black, Brown and Beige (1943); New Orleans Suite (1970).

In Music Is My Mistress, Ellington provided the literal interpretation of his intent when writing Harlem:

It is Sunday morning. We are strolling from 110th Street up Seventh Avenue, heading north through the Spanish and West Indian neighborhood toward the 125th Street business area. You may hear a parade go by, or a funeral, or you may recognize the passage of those who are making civil rights demands. Harlem has its heroes, too: Jackie Robinson, Ray Robinson, Chief Justice Thurgood Marshall, Countee Cullen, Langston Hughes, Bill Robinson.

 In writing of Black, Brown and Beige, broadcast journalist, Audie Cornish opines: 

The title Black, Brown and Beige refers to three movements of a suite, and each one represents a period in black history: "black" being the lives of slaves; "brown" I understand [as] emancipation and service in American wars; and "beige" is when he was taking on contemporary black America at that time.

But of all the recorded suites, 1971’s New Orleans Suite stands out among the more literal suites. 

The suite was written by Ellington on a commission from impresario George Wein, the organizer of the 1971 New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival. Ellington and his orchestra premiered the suite at the festival.

It was imperative that the music written and performed was very literal and evocative of the various periods of New Orleans’s musical growth. The common strain that Ellington used to accomplish this was to make liberal use of the Blues, as well as interpreting the very colorful musical history of the city.

Ellington’s success can be measured by the fact that most anyone listening to the entire suite who is a native of New Orleans or has spent a great deal of time there would easily recognize the music as clearly being descriptive of the “Big Easy” at various times during its musical history.

Ellington was far from a native of New Orleans. Unlike his experience working in Harlem as well as his experiences as a Black man, he had spent very little time in New Orleans. Though the Ellington Orchestra had toured the South and had played in many small towns, he had minimal exposure to the city probably because New Orleans, before the civil rights era, had one of the strictest and most stringently enforced Jim Crow laws in the South. He had visited the city in a professional capacity only twice, previous to his appearance in 1971.

In July of 1935 Ellington was invited to bring his orchestra down to New Orleans. Ellington was to be honored by the Autocratic Club, an all-Black social club. The Orchestra then gave two concerts – one at the Municipal Auditorium for an all-White audience and a second at another venue for people of color.

Ellington's next professional visit to New Orleans was in 1951 as part of a show called “The Big Show of 1951” which, in addition to the Ellington Orchestra, featured Nat Cole, Sarah Vaughan and other Black performers.

With that rather limited exposure to the city, what additional experiences might Ellington have  drawn upon in writing the suite? 

In 1923, Ellington heard the “father” of the soprano saxophone, New Orleans native Sidney Bechet, at the Howard Theater in Washington. Later in the 1920s, Bechet briefly toured with Ellington through New England. That exposed Ellington to the sounds of New Orleans but not to the culture directly.

Probably the biggest influence on Ellington came in December of 1927 when New Orleans native Barney Bigard joined the orchestra as their clarinetist. Bigard's clarinet sound was seeped in the sounds of New Orleans. 

Bigard brought to the band the unique New Orleans clarinet style which utilized the chalumeau register, stressing the instrument’s middle to lower range, with a big mellow sound which sounded conversational, avoiding the shriller sound of many of the clarinetists of the day. Bigard was also very adroit at the polyphonic technics that were so prevalent in New Orleans music in the 1920s and beyond.

 Ellington’s charts were influenced by Bigard. He utilized Bigard's unique sound as a fill in to offset the brassy sounds of the trumpets and trombones and his polyphonically trained ear created opportunities for Ellington to overlay Bigard's warm, woody sound over the music. adding richness and depth to it.  

Beyond the commission from Wein and the implicit expectation that the suite should be truly representative of the city, I would imagine that the pragmatic Ellington, was aware that most all the music in New Orleans is distinctive - It could not be mistaken for the music of any other region of the country. For that matter there are few parts of this country which could be easily identified through its music; one exception being the country music sounds of Nashville ( which is regional in scope). But the indigenous music of New Orleans is so tied to the city's identity and is so identifiable as to provide Ellington with a musical template to work with.

New Orleans’ music was greatly influenced by the music and routine of the daily life of the gumbo of various ethnicities found in the city, in particular the many Creole inhabitants.

To write music which ignores this tie is to risk composing a non-recognizable parody of the city.

So, Ellington was well grounded in the music of the Crescent City and understood the necessary stylistic elements which laid the groundwork for how he approached the writing of what was to become the New Orleans Suite.

Once Ellington completed the Suite, it was imperative that the orchestra have adequate rehearsal time to fit all the pieces together for the festival appearance on April 25 and 26, 1971 and for the subsequent recording. 

Ellington's orchestra arrived in New Orleans on April 20, 1970 and immediately began a five-night appearance at trumpeter Al Hirt's club from April 20 to 24. Presumably Ellington arrived with a complete suite – or at least the five pieces that eventually were recorded at the first recording session a week later. Originally there were six pieces in the suite but a piece titled “Rex" was not recorded and therefore left off the album.

There is no record of what Ellington played that week at Hirt's club but we must assume that those five pieces of the suite were rehearsed during the day and played at the evening performances.   

Oddly, recorded evidence supposedly indicates that only one selection from the suite was performed at the Festival, “Blues for New Orleans.” If this is true, could Ellington have been unhappy with how the rehearsals went and didn't feel that the other pieces were ready to be performed in public? George Wein's commission to Ellington was for a complete suite and we might presume that Wein was paying Ellington for the entire suite to be premiered. Given that Ellington had just spent five days of rehearsals and performances at Al Hirt's club and that the five pieces were soon to be recorded, we might assume that the suite was completed and performance ready. Therefore, it’s reasonable to conclude that all or most pieces were likely performed at the festival.

The album, on Atlantic Records, was recorded during two sessions at National Recording Studios in New York City, with the first session on April 27th, 1970. Recorded were “Blues for New Orleans,”  “Bourbon Street Jingling Jollies,” “ Thanks for the Beautiful Land on the Delta,” “Second Line” and “Aristocracy a la Jean Lafitte.” These were all the non-“Portrait" pieces that comprised the original portion of the suite that was performed at the festival. The “Portrait” pieces, which would serve to complete the album, were Ellington's homages to four of the greatest New Orleans musicians.

Ellington and the band then headed up to Toronto for a six-day stay at the Imperial Room of the Royal York Hotel. During the engagement Ellington played selections from the Suite and most likely worked on and rehearsed the four “Portrait” pieces which were to be recorded soon after the band returned to New York from Toronto. 

The Portraits (all subjects were natives of New Orleans) were recorded back at National on May 13th and included “Portrait of Wellman Braud” (one of Ellington's early bassists), “Portrait of Louis Armstrong,”  “Portrait of Mahalia Jackson” and “Portrait of Sidney Bechet.”

On May 11th , two days before the second recording session, back in New York, Johnny Hodges died in the office of his dentist, suffering a massive heart attack. Ellington had been hopeful that Hodges would play his soprano saxophone, which he had not played on a recording in decades, for the Sidney Bechet “Portrait.” Instead Ellington gave the assignment to tenor saxophonist Paul Gonsalves.

The completed album was released in May of 1971.

The album contains excellent liner notes from Ellington's longtime friend and jack-of-all-trades, Stanley Dance. Dance provides short, concise and informative comments about each composition.

A few additional observations on my part…

The centerpiece of the album is the first band on the album, “Blues for New Orleans.” Ellington brought in his occasional guest artist with the orchestra, organist “Wild” Bill Davis. Davis played the Hammond B3 organ. But unlike Jimmy Smith, Davis favored a fuller sound playing fat block chords, with all of the organ's drawbars pulled out. He sometimes created a sound like you might hear at a roller-skating rink but he was essentially a small orchestra on to himself and very adroit at playing the Blues. In the late 1960s when Ellington might be on hiatus from touring, Davis played gigs with Hodges at Atlantic City and they had recorded a few albums together. So musically, they were very familiar with each other.

In “Blues for New Orleans” Ellington essentially created a piece for Hodges and Davis to solo over a repeated background figure provided by the orchestra, with excitement building throughout the piece as the orchestra really digs in. This is one of the deepest blues that Ellington had ever created and given that this was the last recording that Hodges ever made he definitely went out in style, doing what he had excelled in for so long with the band – playing the Blues.

“Second Line” depicts a New Orleans tradition of attendees at one of the city's many parades (some were for festivals, others for funerals) falling in line behind the marching band and dancing their way down the parade route to celebrate either the life of the living or the life lived by the deceased.  Having personally been present at this spectacle, this piece in the suite might be where Ellington best captured the sheer joy and high spirits that these omnipresent parades can create.  

“Aristocracy a la Jean Lafitte,” Frenchman Lafitte and his gang of pirates were instrumental in helping General Andrew Jackson win the Battle of New Orleans by offering crucial material and tactical support in exchange for a full pardon for all his gang for the crimes they had committed. The music is in 3/4 time and starts out sounding like a French minuet and then accelerates in tempo (as well as about a century or two) into more of a waltz.

“Portrait of Louis Armstrong,” Cootie Williams evokes the young as well as the mature playing of his idol, clearly expressing both the power and sheer exuberance of Armstrong’s playing. 

“Portrait of Mahalia Jackson” is Ellington's love letter to his dear friend, which in musical terms showcases the dignified and gracious manner that she demonstrated throughout her life. As Dance pointed out in the liner notes, the piece acknowledges the importance of the church in New Orleans.

‘Portrait of Sidney Bechet:” Gonsalves utilizes the upper range of the tenor and softens his tone. It's interesting that Ellington did not utilize either of his alto players, Norris Turney or Russell Procope for the solo voice. If only Hodges had lived and dusted off his soprano…

The album was well received by the jazz media: 

Dan Morgenstern's glowing review of the album in 1971 for DownBeat magazine awarded it a perfect five stars.

 The music is evocative, highly atmospheric and marked throughout by the gorgeous ensemble textures that set this orchestra apart from every other big band in the history of jazz, This is a great record, and by any standard one of the major musical events of 1971.

Jack Chambers points out in his book Sweet Thunder (2019):

The period from 1970-1972 was “ … an extraordinarily productive period for Ellington…” and New Orleans Suite might have been the prime recorded accomplishment of that period.

Critic Max Harrison:

New Orleans Suite…was jazz without pretense.

And went on to say about the Suite: 

 The strength of the Ellington unit as a self-perpetuating phenomenon is well instanced here. Four years prior to Ellington's death there were, in the orchestra, players providing links with the beginning and the middle period, and new men also who, like many who had come and gone, were borne up in the collective inspiration which had helped to make those veterans what they had become.

The record was honored at the 1971 Grammy Awards, receiving a Grammy for “Best Jazz Performance by a Big Band” (also referred to as Best Large Jazz Ensemble Performance). 

As Duke Ellington was entering his “Golden Years" in the mid 1960s, he could have retired, taken his Social Security check and every Wednesday meet up with some of his retired compatriots at McDonalds for breakfast and engage in some reminiscing about the “old days.”

 But instead he preferred to enter into another of his many “Golden Eras” composing additional iconic pieces. This period lasted from around 1966 until his death in 1974. In doing so he not only defied the grim reaper (for a while) but quite surprisingly he managed to hold his own against a dramatically changing demographic (young baby boomers); purveyors of the new sounds such as the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Elvis's comeback, etc.; newer genres - soul music, modern folk music, progressive rock; the loss of many of his best musicians to retirement (e.g. , Jimmy Hamilton) and death (e.g. , Johnny Hodges, Billy Strayhorn) or studio work (e.g. , Clark Terry).

His productivity during this period produced a profound boost to Ellington’s legacy. It provided a generation of young people, the early Baby Boomers, an opportunity to experience in essentially real-time, the genius  of Ellington - with many eventually becoming lifetime devotees. If Ellington had not produced such fresh well recorded music during this period, few of this generation would have bothered to look back at the music of what they might have considered their parents’ generation and considered Ellington (if they considered him at all) an anachronism. As Ellington entered his sixth generation of music making in 1970, New Orleans Suite sated the appetite of both Ellington's older followers and provided a gateway for new converts who, having discovered Ellington for the first time, purchased his older works and carried his legacy forward.”