Jazz: Keeping up with the Duke

There isn't much that a small African country can do nowadays to call attention to its cultural sophistication, but almost any attempt deserves applause. This month the Republic of Togo is issuing a series of postage stamps bearing the likenesses of Bach, Beethoven, Debussy and a composer named Edward Kennedy Ellington. It is all very flattering to the Duke, but it would be a mistake for the people of Togo—or anywhere else—to think that this honor stamps him as a classic of the past. If anything, the Duke, at 67, is writing more jazz and writing it better than...