In 1956 Carter Harman wrote the famous Time Magazine cover story on Duke Ellington – the Man of the Year. For this he interviewed Ellington on several occasions. Once the cover story was published, Herman continued to interview Ellington for what was meant to be the Maestro’s autobiography. It never materialized but ended up with more than twenty hours of taped interviews.
In his presentation, Harman talks about the interviews and lets the audience hear what Ellington said in them. A fascinating documentation!
Harman ends by saying: “I wanted to write an autobiography about the secret Ellington but Ellington wanted a printed version of the public Ellington. Duke treaded lightly for almost a year to make me understand it and then I had to give up.”
From what Harman says in the presentation, it seems that it happened when Ellington was on a concert tour in the Virgin Islands or in Porto Rico and sat down on the terrace of Ellington’s hotel room to talk. According to Harman, Duke said to him: “Once you are in the spotlight, you never dare to get out.” And this is the philosophy Ellington made sure impregnated Music Is My Mistress.
Author: Ulf Lundin