Duke Ellington
New York New York
Storyville Records
By George W. Harris

During the last 20-30 years of his life, Duke Ellington put together a
cache of tapes at his own expense of his band in various sizes and
configurations, working out the sounds of the songs that he was wanted
to either record later on, or to debut in a future concert. This
collection of previously unreleased material, captures Ellington's band
from April of 1970 until September 1972. This was the era that Duke had
put out his New Orleans Suite and Afro Eurasian Eclipse albums. the
notable members at the time were Cootie Williams, Chuck Connors, the
sax section of Procope, Hodges (for a bit), Turney, Ashby, Gonsalves,
Carney, and Wild Bill Davis on the organ. There are some interesting
takes on standard Ellingtonia, as well as some tunes that have never
seen the light of day before. For the latter, the most intriguing are
the trio of boppish pieces by Rick Henderson, who was with the band 20
years earlier. You'll get a kick out of "Pretty Girl", "Dreaming By The
Fire" and "Pat Your Feet" with the first two featuring first rate alto
work by Norris Turney. A gently latinized version of "Sophisticated
Lady" is an absolute delight, as is Gonsalves' long solo for "Afrique".
The three clarinet take of "Mood Indigo" segues into a lovely trumpet
solo by Johnny Coles, who was with the band for a short while. That is
the pleasure of these kinds of reissues; it's amazing how well these
sounds have aged. Still fresher than most of what we hear today.