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Rearview Mirror #4
Truly, Beyond Category
by Tom Hull
DUKE ELLINGTON
Masterpieces by Ellington
(1950-51, Columbia/Legacy)
DUKE ELLINGTON
Ellington Uptown
(1947-52, Columbia/Legacy)
The conventional wisdom is that Ellington's career had three peaks:
the 1927-29 "jungle music" period, the supreme 1940-42 band with Jimmy
Blanton and Ben Webster, and his 1956 smash comeback at
Newport. That's kind of like pointing out three summits in the
Himalayas without noting that the tectonic force of the Indian
subcontinent thrust all of Tibet two miles above sea level. Ellington
was such a force that magnificent peaks were inevitable, but
Masterpieces in particular reminds us that even his valleys could be
pretty wondrous. Cut at the beginning of the LP era, it consists of
stretched, lushly orchestrated remakes of three ballads from his
allegedly fallow early '30s: "Mood Indigo," "Sophisticated Lady," and
"Solitude" -- songs that have been recorded over a thousand times --
along with the more recent, and more upbeat, "The Tatooed Bride." In
the mid-'40s, with Blanton dead, Webster gone, bebop redefining hip,
and R&B capturing pop, Ellington went his own way, becoming what
we now recognize as America's Greatest Composer. He did this by
stringing his melodies together to form suites and by polishing the
orchestration. He started the '40s with a great dance band (cf. his
famous 1940 concert in Fargo, N.D.), and by mid-decade was playing
Carnegie Hall. But until the advent of the LP it wasn't possible to
reproduce his longer works. Masterpieces was meant to show that
his already famous songs could be gussied up to challenge the accepted
standards of Euro-classical sophistication, and it's a beautiful,
extravagantly vivid piece of work.
Ellington Uptown, cut in 1952 with his band upset by the
departure of Johnny Hodges, is more of a mixed bag. Again, he dug into
his songbook for "The Mooche," "Perdido," and a rousing "Take the 'A'
Train" highlighted by Betty Roché's scat vocal. But he also included a
feature for new drummer Louis Bellson and the long "A Tone Parallel to
Harlem (Harlem Suite)" -- one of the most complex (and brilliant)
things he ever recorded. The new edition adds two earlier extended
pieces, "The Controversial Suite" and "The Liberian Suite," to forge a
sterling example of this transitional period. Ellington's suites
aren't all that easy to listen to -- in particular, the rhythm can
trip up, and the shifts sometimes seem awkward -- but he is capable of
surpassing beauty, especially with the horns. Ellington used to claim
that his real instrument was his band; that was never more obvious
than on these early '50s records.
PAUL DESMOND/GERRY MULLIGAN
Two of a Mind
(1962, Bluebird)
DUKE ELLINGTON
Duke Ellington's Far East Suite
(1966, Bluebird)
This is the third time these records have been rereleased on CD:
first in 1991, again in 1996, and then last year. The first two times
they came out in midprice packages, similar to the original LP
configurations. The strategy this time is to stuff them with bonus
tracks and price them high. One can argue whether that's a good deal,
but what's inarguable is that these are two of the real treasures in
Bluebird's extensive (and often out of print) catalog. (Whatever
happened to Early Ellington? The Great Ellington Units?
Lionel Hampton's Hot Mallets?) Best known for his work with
Dave Brubeck, Desmond's sound on alto sax was cool, clean, and
remarkably pretty. Mulligan, in turn, played an exceptionally fluid
baritone sax, and this loose, friendly program nicely contrasts the
two horns' styles. Inspired by a 1963 tour that stretched from
Damascus to Calcutta, Ellington's Far East Suite is a set of
relatively independent pieces based on Asian scales and evocative of
their discoveries, but dressed up to exploit the band's panoramic
colors: the high trumpet on "Tourist Point of View," the marvelous
piano theme that kicks off "Mount Harissa," the trilling clarinet on
"Ad Lib on Nippon," the sheer beauty of "Isfahan."
VARIOUS ARTISTS
Saucy Calypsos: Volume One
(Ice)
Calypso is the most literate of the world's musics -- check the
dazzling wordplay of stars like Mighty Sparrow and Lord Kitchener --
but this promising collection of double entendres takes more entendre
than I can muster, even with the crutch of a lyric sheet. Kitch's
"Handy Man" is the easiest of the bunch, and I get how Duke's "The
Dentist" promises "to get the fill to fit inside proper/I'll have to
drill to open it wider," but I don't see what's so saucy about
Sparrow's plot for his girlfriend to "Sell the Pussy" ("And bring all
the cash to me"). What is saucy is the music, with its slinky beat and
popping horns. No Volume Two as yet, but the label seems to have a
lock on classic calypso, and it's good news that their Mighty Sparrow
comps are back in print again.
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