By Marilyn Lester***Bravo to Wynton Marsalis and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra (JLCO) for shining a bright spotlight on Duke Ellington’s African-derived music with Duke in Africa. The goal to explore these traditions, and how Ellington’s music resonates with audiences
worldwide, hit the mark, with numbers selected from Afro-Bossa (1963), Liberian Suite (1947, written for Liberia’s centennial), Togo Brava Suite (1971), and beyond. The ever-sharp, in-the-pocket JLCO was ably music directed by reed players Alexa Tarantino and Chris Lewis— and what a joy to hear Ellington’s music apart from the well-known and oft-played standards.
During his lifetime (1899-1974), Ellington wrote about 3,000 pieces of music in a very wide array of genres, including creating large-scale jazz-based compositions in the “suite” form. His first such creation was 1931’s Creole Rhapsody. When the US State Department officially launched the Jazz Ambassadors program in 1956, Ellington was on board, visiting the Middle East/South Asia (1963), Africa (notably Senegal, 1966), the Soviet Union/
Eastern Europe (1971) and parts of Asia/Africa again in 1972–73, subsequently writing music related to his travels.
One of the most colorful of the selections was the Liberian Suite’s “Dance #4,” which Ellington described as the arrival of the chieftain—intensely percussive, with strong drum statements and horn section features suggestive of dancers. Dance #5 was similarly evocative. Two important contenders from Billy Strayhorn, were “Tigress” with its driving Latin rhythmic undercurrent; and “Absinthe” (a ballad reminiscent of “Chelsea Bridge”), both from Afro-Bossa. As a tribute to both Strayhorn and Ellington the JLCO played the former’s “Lotus Blossom,” featuring pianist Dan Nimmer; it was Ellington’s favorite Strayhorn composition, played hauntingly by Ellington on And His Mother Called Him Bill, a tribute album to “Swee’ Pea” after his death.
A barn-burner version of 1940’s 
“Cotton Tail,” featuring trumpeter Marsalis, used the rewritten arrangement by Ellington for the Togo Brava Suite. Trumpeter Kenny Rampton was featured on “Montage,” from Ellington’s 1963 My People, a suite commissioned for the Century of Negro Progress Exposition in Chicago. Lewis aced a tour-de-force feature on Togo Brava’s “Naturellement,” which Ellington referred to as “into the jungle.” And on the closer, trumpeter Marcus Printup took center stage on Ellington-Strayhorn’s 1951 composition, “The Eighth Veil,” not part of a suite, but frequently played on The Duke Ellington Orchestra’s European tours.
Ellingtonian top hats are off once again for the brilliant work of the 15-piece Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, not only a technically proficient unit, but full of the soulful spirit that continues to celebrate an American genius and one of the most significant and prolific composers of this nation and beyond.
Photos by Luigi-Beverelli
