It has just become available and has music from 2 February to 21 December 1932. Most of the recordings in Volume 4 are recordings made by American Record Corporation (ARC) and were issued on the Brunswick and Colunbia labels at the time. However, many takes stayed in the vaults but has been issued on LPs or CDs over the years and are now included with excellent sound in Volume 4.
ARC recordings were issued by Mosaic in the box The Complete 1932-1940 Brunswick/Columbia/Master Recordings by Duke Ellington and His Famous Orchestra.
Everything on the first two CDs in the box are included included in Volume 4 together with some RCA-Victor recordings.
Most interesting are the three takes of Mood Indigo/ Hot And Bothered/ Creole Love Call from the 3 February 1932 recording session plus the famous “stereo sound” version of the same melodies. It has very good sound! Volume 4 also has the stereo version of the East St. Louis Toodle-O/ Lot O’ Fingers/ Black And Tan Fantasy from 9 February, 1932 together with the two mono takes.
Dinah and Bugle Call Rag also recorded at the 9 February session plus Maori from 21 September 1932 are also part of the new Ellington in Order.
Let me finish with a comment that might be controversial. If one already has the Mosaic and RCA-Victor boxes and a decent setup for playing CD, does it make sense to get a streaming media subscription for Ellington in Order?
No if you are happy with you have. Yes if you like to listen to Ellington in Order on your mobile phone everywhere but subscribe then to a streaming service not so expensive like Spotify and get good quality headphones (if you don’t have one already). Qobuz and Tidal are definitively overkills.
Sony Music provides 44 mHz 24 bits files to the streaming services but none of them seems to provide the music in this quality even if some them claims to do so. Further more, as many have said, Sony should have provided Ellington in Order also as 96 mHz 24 bits files to make a real difference!
Author: Ulf Lundin