Duke Ellington: Black, Brown and Beige

Product Description

This recording offers some of Ellington's most famous big-band works in orchestrations for full symphony orchestra. This is the first ever recording coupling all these pieces on one CD. The Buffalo Philharmonic under JoAnn Falletta gives brilliant, idiomatic performances and terrific sound by Grammy-award-winning producer, Tim Handley.

‘By any measure, Duke Ellington is one of the greatest artists of the 20th century. . . In his Black Brown and Beige, the Duke created a tribute to the tradition of African-American religious faith in the first movement, an elegy to the African-Americans who gave their lives in the Civil War and World Wars I and II, and an evocation of the dawning of a unique culture in Harlem in the 1920s in the final movement.' – JoAnn Falletta

Review

Edward Kennedy ‘Duke' Ellington wrote some of the 20th century's
greatest Big Band music, but he also wrote in a variety of forms. The
evocative Harlem pays tribute to Ellington's roots. Black, Brown and
Beigesets work songs and spirituals, while the suite from The River
shows his genius in writing for the stage. Three Black Kings, scored
as a ballet, was left unfinished at his death, and Ellington s
arrangement of Billy Strayhorn's Take the ‘A' Train ranks among the
most widely recorded standards of all time. –WFMT Radio, February 2013

‘Sophisticated Lady,' ‘Satin Doll,' and ‘Mood Indigo' are just three
of the myriad of jazz standards that came from the pen and heart of
Edward ‘Duke' Ellington (1899-1974). Ellington, however, was also an
accomplished creator of larger scale compositions, and the Buffalo
Philharmonic Orchestra, under the baton of JoAnn Falletta, has
recorded a set of several of these works, and the result is a
powerhouse set from an under-recognized orchestral composer. . . The
orchestra is clearly enjoying its detour into the jazz world, which
includes some wonderful thematic surprises during the individual solos
presented in the piece. –Edge Network, Steven Bergman, March 2013

Artistic Quality 10 / Sound Quality 10: The performances are just
marvelous. JoAnn Falletta catches the music's ‘swing' in vivid
interpretations that challenge Peress in their vitality, color, and
verve. The various instrumental soloists, especially Sal Andolina's
clarinet in Three Black Kings and Tony Di Lorenzo on trumpet in Take
te ‘A' Train (and elsewhere), are all brilliant, and captured by
Naxos' engineers in bright, natural, high-impact sound. This is a very
necessary release, but one that should get a lot of play as well. It's
a joy. –ClassicsToday.com, David Hurwitz, April 2013