About this item
A major new biography of Duke Ellington from the acclaimed author of Pops A Life of Louis ArmstrongEdward Kennedy Duke Ellington was the greatest jazz composer of the twentieth centuryand an impenetrably enigmatic personality whom no one not even his closest friends claimed to understand The grandson of a slave he dropped out of high school to become one of the worlds most famous musicians a showman of incomparable suavity who was as comfortable in Carnegie Hall as in the nightclubs where he honed his style He wrote some fifteen hundred compositions many of which like Mood Indigo and Sophisticated Lady remain beloved standards and he sought inspiration in an endless string of transient lovers concealing his inner self behind a smiling mask of flowery language and ironic charmAs the biographer of Louis Armstrong Terry Teachout is uniquely qualified to tell the story of the public and private lives of Duke Ellington Duke peels away countless layers of Ellingtons evasion and public deception to tell the unvarnished truth about the creative genius who inspired Miles Davis to say All the musicians should get together one certain day and get down on their knees and thank Duke.
About the Author
I'm the drama critic of the Wall Street Journal, the critic-at-large of Commentary, and the author of "Duke: A Life of Duke Ellington," which will be published in October of 2013. I also blog about the arts at www.terryteachout.com. In addition to the books on this page, I've written a play, "Satchmo at the Waldorf," which was produced in 2012 by Shakespeare & Company of Lenox, Mass., Long Wharf Theatre of New Haven, Conn., and Philadelphia's Wilma Theater, and the libretti for two operas by Paul Moravec, "The Letter" and "Danse Russe." "Pops: A Life of Louis Armstrong," which came out in 2009, was my first book about music, but I've been listening to jazz ever since my mother told me to come see Satchmo singing "Hello, Dolly!" on "The Ed Sullivan Show" in 1964, and I was a professional bassist before becoming a full-time writer. Among other things, I've written the liner notes for such albums as Diana Krall's "All for You," Maria Schneider's "Coming About," Karrin Allyson's "Daydream," Marian McPartland's "Just Friends," Luciana Souza's "Neruda," and Roger Kellaway's "Live at the Jazz Standard."
