Search - Duke Ellington :: Festival Session

Playing For The Crowd

F. Hagan | Raleigh, North Carolina, USA | 01/10/2005

(4 out of 5 stars)

""Festival Session" captures the Duke Ellington Orchestra fresh from their tour on the celebrated summer jazz festival circuit in a studio recording completed just after Labor Day in 1959. The album was recorded from 8 AM in the morning until noon, brimming with the sunny expressiveness of warm weather and the day as opposed to the expected cool, evening vibe of the nightclub. The "jazz festival" brought Ellington's music and obvious composition skills to contemporary white American audiences, and the material on the original recording is regarded as one of the Duke's most cherished and exciting albums. The new release CD of "Festival Session" contains all of the expected classic showmanship and energy-and two previously unavailable tracks from this period as an added bonus for Ellington aficionados!



Album highlights include the gorgeous Juan Tizol composition "Perdido"--check out the Clark Terry fuglehorn solo on this delightful recording (as well as his handiwork in Idiom `59 Part 3). "Copout Extension" is a verifiable marathon for Paul Gonsalves' tenor sax, clocking in at 8 minutes and 17 seconds. The three part suite "Idiom Parts 1-3" gives tremendous presence to the clarinets as played by Russell Procope and Jimmy Hamilton. Dancers mining this album for diamonds will certainly enjoy "Things Ain't What They Used to be," composed by the Duke's son Mercer, and pervaded with smooth, relaxed energy. The spectacle of the summer venues and their inherent required showmanship is best exemplified by a then-new three part suite "Duael Fuel"--a showcase and battle for the drummers Sam Woodyard and Jimmy Johnson. The imagination and the future of travel are given voice by the Duke, known mainly for the trains he has immortalized, but with "Launching Pad" he reaches for outer space. Of the bonus material, "Jam with Sam" allows the trumpet player Shorty Baker to shine, and "V.I.P.'s Boogie" is a great grooving track that should find its way onto swingin' dance floors everywhere.



The great workmanship this recording exemplifies is the effortless presentation of the musicians and their various skills. Like a jazzy, swinging Peter and the Wolf, the "Festival Session" gives personality and direction to the instruments in the ensemble, and gives insight into jazz from the summer of 1959 (and beyond).



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All showstoppers in search of a show

Matthew Watters | Vietnam | 01/04/2009

(2 out of 5 stars)

"I'm adding my two-cents here just because the other reviewers are too generous. While it's hard to hate the Ellington band, especially during the period of 1957-59, when it was stuffed with talented soloists and Duke was clearly feeling inspired, this album of charts put together solely to evoke excitement among big, unsophisticated festival crowds comes across as just that: over-the-top, shrill and, ultimately, rather exhausting. Sure, there's some exciting playing here, particularly from Clark Terry and Paul Gonsalves, but it's all in the "more-is-more" mode. After a decent rendition of "Perdido", it quickly wears out its welcome. I mean, who buys an Ellington album to hear an extended drum battle between two drum kits? Yikes. Best Duke studio album of this period is still probably Blues in Orbit, and best live recording is perhaps the At the Blue Note set."