Duke Ellington - Volume 2 The Uncollected Duke Ellington and his Orchestra 1946

This collection picks off where the volume 1 left off and includes excerpts from radio transcriptions from March 28, July 11, and July 16, 1946.  This is around the fifth or sixth Ellington album from 1946 that I'm writing about and each time there's something a little different or unique about each performance.  Ellington took great care to program his concerts in a way that kept everything fresh for the band.  

The March 28 date in New York, covered in volume 1, yielded two more songs: the war horse "Perdido" and "Tip Toe Topic", a feature for Oscar Pettiford who plays the whole melody on in head.  According to Sonny Greer, this was the only performance of this song.  With "Blue Abandon", that would mean that Pettiford had two features on that date.   But according to the Ellington discography on Ellingtonia.com, neither song was performed again and it doesn't seem as if Pettiford had any other features.  Perhaps, bass features were just not cutting it for a big band in 1946,  even with someone of Oscar Pettiford stature in a band such as Duke Ellington's.

Russell Procope

After dates around the country, including Texas (where someone shot off a gun to coerce Ellington in playing the man's request!), Massachusetts, Washington, D.C., the band ended up in Los Angeles for a few weeks where the July 11 and 16 concerts were held.  It must have been a busy time as the band also entered the studio on July 9.  The personnel for the July dates are the same minus trumpeter Bernard Flood is replaced by Harold "Shorty" Baker and Ray Nance and alto saxophonist Otto Hardwicke is replaced by newocomer Russell Procope.  

One of those tunes recorded on July 9 was "Just Squeeze Me" and it was fascinating re-make of "Subtle Slough" with train rhythms and bell whistle sounds.  The July 11 version is taken at a much slower tempo and is much different.  Though the loping feel and the triplet bass line are still there, the arrangement is different with train imitation sounds gone and what sounds like a new coda.    Vocalist Al Hibbler shines on two songs "Pretty Woman" and "You don't love me no more" (featuring Sears doing a Ben Webster imitation, speaking of).  Cat Anderson co-wrote "Gathering' in a Clearing"saying that "anybody can tell it was my riff because there wasn't no preachers in the Ellington band till I joined.  Wasn't no rooty-tooters till I got there!".  Indeed, the composition has a strong gospel sound with plagal cadence that sounds like it would fit right in with Horace Silver and the Hard Bop period or even something that Thad Jones may have written.  On this tune, he is featured with the plunger mute.  He does the same on "Rockabye River", a tune originally known as "Hop, Skip, and Jump" and was co-composed by Strayhorn though he didn't receive credit,

Oscar Pettiford with cello and Duke Ellington

"Suddenly it jumped" was also recorded on the 9th, and this time the arrangement is identical.  Difference is that instead of trading with Ellington, Pettiford blasts off on his own solo and Ellington lets him take the bridge before the final theme is played.  "Hey Baby" is a light-hearted, easy paced song featuring Ray Nance on vocals.  On this tune and this record in general, drummer Sonny Greer's fills seem to really pop out and his feel and energy really comes through.  The last tune is the only recording by Duke Ellington of "Come Rain or Come Shine".  Featuring a wonderful vocal by Kay Davis, this slow, swing ballad features some nice reharmonization here and there.  

The biggest surprises of this compilation is the inclusion of two Basie charts: "9:20 Special" and "One O'Clock Jump",  the encore for the July 16 radio program.  Given Ellington's status even in 1946 as a great composer, I'm a little surprised he chose to include those pieces or that they're even in his book.  Turns out they were part of the book since at least April of that year.  Yet they still sound like Ellington as he added new parts, especially for "One O'Clock Jump" where there's also a new introduction, coda and backgrounds.  Even the soloists imitate the original: Ellington's first chorus is sparse like Basie, but in his second chorus, Ellington re-establishes himself with a familiar long, downward arpeggios and curious chord substitutions that are his staple.  Tenor saxophonist Al Sears does the opposite, playing his own material first and then imitating Lester Young's famous solo, eventually making his chromatic lick at the end his own.  Trumpeter Shorty Baker also quotes from Buck Clayton's solo.  There's no trombone on the 1937 original recording, but trombonist Lawrence Brown aptly plays in the roaring Kansas City style emphasizing his upper register.  

1996 CD cover of UK compilation of
material from the same era

On the Basie version, the quiet chorus highlights Walter Page's bass line and is only there to bring a pause before the final hurrah.  Ellington turns it around and builds tension through five choruses adding new backgrounds (including Lester Young's chromatic line) and a melody line which starts on beat four.  To me, that is more of an Ellington idea, especially because that chord is a diminished chord which then gets resolved.  Overall a fantastic performance and a quick look into how Ellington composed.  The other nice thing is hearing the soloists copy or mimic other soloists.  I was always told that musicians did this as a gesture to the original recording.  And indeed on Basie's 1942 version of "One O'Clock Jump", all soloists, including Basie, play the same solos from the original.

"9:20 Special" has less Ellington and more Basie and to my ears it's very easy to hear.  The melody makes his use of cup mutes and the call and response between saxes and brass is more pronounced.  Basie's arrangers also made use of saxophone solis bending into the high register and, check, that is also present here.  Finally, the transition between choruses features saxes on a dominant pedal as a kind of windup back to the form.