What if the first music you heard was Duke Ellington?

[thedwork]

So there....everything explained

At your service, sir!

[Brownian Motion]

I cut my jazz teeth on my father's collection of 78s. He didn't have much Ellington--the RCA Victor "Black Brown & Beige" set of 12" 78s were all broken, though he had kept the larger chunks and the album covers. He also had a Brunswick label copy of "Pyramid", though that had been attacked by mildew, and was unplayable. The flip side of "Pyramid" played fine; it was "When My Sugar Walks Down the Street" (All the Little Birdies Go Tweet Tweet Tweet), with a good humored Ivie Anderson vocal and a nice solo by Cootie Williams. This tune became the one I associated with Ellington for the next couple of years, until I bought the LP "At His Very Best".

Here's a somewhat related thread--

http://www.organissimo.org/forum/index.php?showtopic=18880&st=0&p=346027&hl=rhapsody%20&fromsearch=1&#entry346027

Edited August 16, 2010 by Brownian Motion

[medjuck]

I saw Ellington once in New Haven in the early fall of 1972. The concert was filmed at least in part (I remember, much to my dismay, a TV camera being set up almost directly in front of my seat), and I often had wished that I could go back and recapture that experience. Earlier this year I received the audio portion of an Ellington concert in New York City from within a few months of the New Haven concert. The sense of deja vu was striking.

I've had the same experience:there's a DVD of Ellington in Montreal from the same venue and same week as one of the times I saw him. However the other occasion was more interesting: It was EKE's birthday and the club was full of well wishers most of whom seemed old to me (they were probably a lot younger than I am now). They began throwing out requests for swing standards made famous by other bands. I thought this was very uncool but maybe they were aware of his "Will The Big Bands Ever Come Back" and I wasn't.

The result was amazing. Duke would play a chorus with just the rhythm section, then one or two horns would join in for a chorus and then then whole band would begin improvising (as far as I could tell) background riff till they reached a final full band out chorus! I was stunned.

[AllenLowe]

I actually think Mercer was the talented one - and Irving Mills.

[John L]

What I want to know is...

...what if the first music that you ever heard, GOOD GOD, was the 12 minute version of Soul Power with Bootsie, Catfish (RIP), and the rest of 'em.

Edited August 17, 2010 by John L

[JSngry]

I have no idea what the first music I heard was. We had music playing all the time in the house when I was a kid, and I've had a record player of my own as long as I can remember.

all I can say about the matter in question was that one of the records that got played in the house was this one:

Don't know if you can see what all's on there, but it's a little bit of everything, a whole lot of nothing. 60 Years Of Music America Loves Best, hey.

What I do remember is that for as long as I can remember hearing that album, the one Duke cut on it, "Take The A Train", always stood out, just the sound and the vibe. Even before I knew the whats and whys, I knew that Duke Ellington Music as not like any other I'd yet to encounter. Still isn't.

Then I saw the guy on TV with that longass head, the hair starting toi curl up in the back, and I knew then this guy was a freak of the best possible kind.

Then I actually started listening for real...

[GA Russell]

I remember well watching Saturday morning cartoons when I was two and three years old. Remember Bosco and Cookie, the monkeys? My recollection is that the music for those cartoons was Ellington jungle music. I still think of Bosco and Cookie when I hear Ellington of that era.

Edited August 17, 2010 by GA Russell

[dalemcfarland]

I'm fairly certain the first music I ever heard was "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" on a music box my mother clipped to my crib. But that aside...

Growing up, I had a pile of those little yellow children's records featuring Gene Autry and Burl Ives etc. My parents had a very small collection of LPs which included 101 Strings-type stuff, soundtracks like The Alamo and South Pacific, a box set of Reader's Digest schmaltz, and, incredibly enough, Spike Jones' "Thank You Music Lovers" which (much to their exasperation, I'm sure) I played repeatedly. There was no jazz in the house.

It was the early 60s and I was 12 or 13 when, flipping through AM radio late one night, I found jazz for the first time. It was the weirdest, most beautiful thing I'd ever heard. It was someone playing piano in a way I had never before imagined. It was serious and humorous at the same time. It made me just sit there and listen. It was Thelonious Monk.

It destroyed my life.

[A Lark Ascending]

First Ellington I heard was actually Steely Dan c. 1974...their reconstruction of 'East St. Louis Toodle Oo' for rock instruments but quite un-rock like. Then a version of 'Creole Love Call' by Mike Westbrook's Orchestra. I think I'd read about Ellington or about other musician's (Stan Tracey) love of Ellington before I bought a record by him, though I must have heard things on Jazz Record Requests.

I then took a chance with this:

A 3 LP set put out by The Sunday Times in the UK in conjunction with RCA. It was a real leap in the dark for me in 1978 but proved a wonderful primer. One LP of 'popular' Duke, one of 'historic' and one of 'longer' (including BB&B), drawn from across the full timespan of his RCA recordings. I was smitten.

The strange thing is that, apart from Billie Holiday, it would be another 15 years or so before I began to develop any interest in any other pre-1940s jazz. Over those years I built up my Ellington knowledge through those French RCA black and white twofers and some of the later RCA and Columbia things. And, of course, I was constantly bumping into other musician's takes on the Ellington/Strayhorn music book.

When the big centenary box came out in 2000 (?) I made my most expensive single recording purchase ever!

[Hot Ptah]

First Ellington I heard was actually Steely Dan c. 1974...their reconstruction of 'East St. Louis Toodle Oo' for rock instruments but quite un-rock like. Then a version of 'Creole Love Call' by Mike Westbrook's Orchestra. I think I'd read about Ellington or about other musician's (Stan Tracey) love of Ellington before I bought a record by him, though I must have heard things on Jazz Record Requests.

I then took a chance with this:

A 3 LP set put out by The Sunday Times in the UK in conjunction with RCA. It was a real leap in the dark for me in 1978 but proved a wonderful primer. One LP of 'popular' Duke, one of 'historic' and one of 'longer' (including BB&B), drawn from across the full timespan of his RCA recordings. I was smitten.

The strange thing is that, apart from Billie Holiday, it would be another 15 years or so before I began to develop any interest in any other pre-1940s jazz. Over those years I built up my Ellington knowledge through those French RCA black and white twofers and some of the later RCA and Columbia things. And, of course, I was constantly bumping into other musician's takes on the Ellington/Strayhorn music book.

When the big centenary box came out in 2000 (?) I made my most expensive single recording purchase ever!

Why did you change your forum name, Bev?

[A Lark Ascending]

Why did you change your forum name, Bev?

I was googled a couple of times by kids at school (when they were meant to be working!!!!) and they landed here (my name is not common!). They got distracted! For a few seconds, before they found it all quite boring. Thought it best to avoid such situations.

[Chuck Nessa]

I'd think boring your students is your job.

[A Lark Ascending]

I'd think boring your students is your job.

I can do that without the aid of technology. It comes naturally.

[jazzbo]

I have no real idea what the first music I heard was. I'm reasonably sure it was not Duke Ellington!

When I came to Duke's music what amazed me was the arrangements. (And who knows, did I hear Duke, or See'Pea? or . . .?) The way that the instruments were blended to create that "effect". . . that drew me in to listen and listen.

[JSngry]

What I want to know is...

...what if the first music that you ever heard, GOOD GOD, was the 12 minute version of Soul Power with Bootsie, Catfish (RIP), and the rest of 'em.

Then you'd be fueled by indefatigable superhuman strength to live in a world of endless mendacious mediocrity.

Kind of a blessing/curse thing...

[medjuck]

I just remembered a story my Dad telling me about my early music appreciation. Apparently I loved the drinking song from The Student Prince ("Drink, drink, drink..."). As soon as he'd finished playing the disc I'd start saying "play it again Daddy, play it again". I expect it was a few more years before I heard any EKE.

[Larry Kart]

I just remembered a story my Dad telling me about my early music appreciation. Apparently I loved the drinking song from The Student Prince ("Drink, drink, drink..."). As soon as he'd finished playing the disc I'd start saying "play it again Daddy, play it again". I expect it was a few more years before I heard any EKE.

At one point -- maybe, in the third or fourth grade -- I was crazy about "The Happy Wanderer," the "valderi, valdera" song. I'd sing it to myself every morning as I walked to school. Good grief. Also, another similar piece of glee-club dreck that had to do with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

Actually, now I think of it, a record I bought (maybe the first one I bought) that helped save me from madness around that time was Sammy Davis Jr.'s "Something's Gotta Give." Didn't know the concept yet, but I liked it because it swung.

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

My earliest memory is singing along with my Mum to "Open the door, Richard", when I was a 3 year old.

The first music I really HEARD was Fats Domino's. I always maintain that I love R&B because I encountered Fats before Presley.

Nuff sed.

MG

[Jazzmoose]

I have no real idea what the first music I heard was.

I have a hard time believing anyone does.