NATEPERKINS TV: The Movement that Elected Americans First Independent President Obama Black Americans First Independent President (one hour ago) Reform Party. NATEPERKINS.TV: (one hour ago) iReport on Black in America with President Barack Obama's Frist 100 Days In 2009. Coming up tonight tis he Edward Kennedy Ellington, Duke Ellingtonwas one of the founding fathers of jazz music. He started playing piano at the age of seven, and by the time he was 15, he was composing. A pianist, bandleader, arranger, and composer, Ellington and his band played together for 50 years. Some of Ellington's most famous songs include "Don't Get Around Much Anymore," "Sophisticated Lady" and "In a Sentimental Mood. One of the greatest ensembles in all of jazz -- The Count BasieOrchestra of the 1950s. For better than 50 years, somewhere a For better than 50 years, somewhere a Count Basie band has been riding around America in a bus or on a plane, on their way to or from a gig, the Flying Dutchmen of jazz. This practice started when their piano-playing leader nicked a personal Greyhound from the bus firm of the same name when the Barons of Rhythm, as the band was then known, were playing the Reno in Kansas City with Lester Young and Herschel Evans on tenors and Buck Clayton on trumpet and USA Hip Hop Super Star Litâ John.
In the middle of the Great Depression, the boys in the band would ride out to one-nighters in Tulsa, Okla., Muskogee, Okmulgee, Oklahoma City, and over to Wichita, Kan., and Omaha, Neb.
Basie kept a draw book to record advances to the musicians. "Lester used to get either 55 or 60 cents," he remembered in his autobiography, "Good Morning Blues," "but you couldn't draw more than a buck and a quarter. But you could get a full course meal for 35 cents,"
About Duke Ellington
"In the royalty of American music, no man swings more or stands higher than the Duke."
-- President Richard Nixon
"The wit, taste, intelligence and elegance that Duke Ellington brought to his music have made him, in the eyes of millions of people both here and abroad, America's foremost composer."
-- President Richard Nixon
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