Tag: Duke Ellington
An Evening With Edward Kennedy Ellington
Black sartorial splendor! I will be chronicling how blackness influenced style in my book. Wish me luck finishing it this summer.
Duke’s Satorial Style Was as Elegant as his Music
Magic Moments at Duke’s Place
On April 29, 1999, the centennial of the birth of Edward Kennedy “Duke” Ellington, I sat outside the elegant brick and stone building on ST. Nicholas avenue, in the Sugar Hill section of Harlem, and listened to some sonic gems from the late jazz master’s copious musical ouvre, a repertoire that includes over 2000 compositions. Now a national historical landmark, the unassuming and well kept little building was the site of many of the Duke’s numerous compositions about his beloved Harlem.
Sitting outside Duke’s crib, listening to “Take The A Train,” “Harlem Airshaft,” and “Black, Brown and Beige Suite,” I could feel his presence; and it resurrected memories of an enchanted evening I once spent with him in his downtown digs back in the early seventies, when the master was in the twilight of his wonderful…
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