Why another Ellington biography? The sub-title, A Spiritual Biography, is critical. While Steed does an excellent job of re-telling the standard Ellington story, her special province is the spiritual ...

Duke Ellington “has always been a little hard to figure,” said Chris Foran in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. He embodied civilized refinement on stage but struggled offstage to juggle all of his ...

Duke Ellington's impact on jazz seems beyond measure, no matter how you count it. He wrote, co-wrote or took credit for writing more than 1,000 compositions over a 50-year span. According to one ...

This year marks 125 years since the birth of jazz legend Duke Ellington. The bandleader, composer and pianist died 50 years ago. In the new book “The Jazzmen,” biographer Larry Tye sets out to ...

This spring marks both the 50th anniversary of Duke Ellington’s death, and what would have been his 125th birthday. Why is it that out of the hundreds of musicians who electrified the nightclubs of ...

Mercedes Ellington has always known her grandfather was different. The world-renowned dancer can still vividly recall heading to New York City’s Apollo Theater alongside her grandmother to watch her ...

In an age where the term "relevance" feels like the single dominant tenant of nearly all of us in the education community, the significance of the work of Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington continues to ...

A new book by Larry Tye — The Jazzmen — traces how the popularity of musicians Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong and Count Basie affected the civil rights movement. Sponsor Message MICHEL MARTIN, BYLINE ...