The biweekly Down Beat takes its jazz seriously and is not given to tossing off thoughtless accolades. But last week four-fifths of the magazine was devoted to one man, Edward Kennedy Ellington—the Duke. One tribute: "The first American composer to catch in his music the true jazz spirit."
The magazine had its eye on an anniversary coming up next month; it will be a quarter century since Duke Ellington moved into Harlem's high-kicking Cotton Club with a ten-man band and began to beat out jungle-style rhythms. Those were the days when Paul Whiteman's "symphonic jazz" was the rage and Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue had just staggered
Manhattan's old Aeolian Hall, but the Duke stuck to his own style and rapidly built up a following. By 1935, most of the U.S. was humming such Ellington compositions as Mood Indigo, Sophisticated Lady and Solitude.
Down Beat's issue is packed with dozens of tributes from every quarter of the music compass, from Composer Deems Taylor and Songwriter Cole Porter to Bopster Billy Eckstine and Weeper Johnnie Ray. Learned articles trace his musical history and speculate on his future.
But the Duke goes his own way, now primitive, now sophisticated; even, in the past decade, "progressive." Still the bandleader-composer insists he has not switched styles, but has only "grown naturally, from the inside out."
Since the Ellington method of making an arrangement consists of trying things out with the band by ear—a kind of group composition—his music strongly reflects the styles and strong points of his players at any given time. The Duke has had a phenomenal record for keeping his ' men with him (Harry Carney, the baritone sax, since the Cotton Club opening), but changes were bound to occur. New men have brought new musical styles, and the band has developed accordingly. "We haven't eliminated anything," the Duke says. "We just kept piling more sounds on top."
This week, with a driving white drummer and a trumpeter whose favorite range is up with the piccolos, the Duke is raising the roof at Manhattan's Paramount Theater, and later this month he will display his latest style at Carnegie Hall. He no longer has a musical home like the Cotton Club; when the anniversary date rolls around, he will be barnstorming in Iowa. As for all the anniversary excitement among his fans, the Duke, a reserved fellow, smiles and says, "Well, yes, I guess I have been taking a few extra bows lately."