The new issue has of course the DESS Ellington 125 mini conference in Stockholm on April 29, 2024 as a particular focus.
Bo Haufman gives a two page summary of the six presentations at the conference and Thomas Harne writes about the Ellington concert by Stockholm Swing All Stars at the Scala Theatre in the center of Stockholm. He is very enthusiastic about it and gives a detailed desciption of what the band played. To two articles are supplemented by nice photos of the participants.
The presentations are also available for listening and viewing at the DESS Ellington Galaxy website (http:// ellingtongalaxy.org). They were published 0n May 10, May 11, May 20, May 29, June 15 and June 17
The website have also a summary of the conference published on May 5 (https://ellingtongalaxy.org/2024/05/05/dess-ellington-125-a-summary)
The Swedish jazz magazin JAZZ – better known as Orkesterjournalen to many of us – published three articles in its first issue for 2024 to celebrate the 100 anniversary of the birth of Alice Babs. One of the articles was written by Jan Bruér. The new Bulletin has an English version of it and it is highly recommeneded.
The anniversary was also recognised by the jazz section of the Swedish Radio, which broadcasted a program about her on Jan. 21, 2024. It is still available at https://sverigesradio.se/avsnitt/alice-babs-och-livsdrommen-som-blev-sann but the speaker text is of course in Swedish.
Among other interesting readings in the new issue is an excerpt from a series of interviews that the Danish journalist Henrik Wolsgard-Iversen conducted with Ben Webster in December 1969 and Januari 1970 about his time in the Ellington orchestra and an article about Creole Love Call by Mike Zirpolo from his Swing & Beyond website (www.swingandbeyond.com).
Bo Haufman has also contributed a couple of articles with music content. One is about Duke Ellington’s song The Dicty Glide recorded in March 1929 and the other about the song Cow Cow Boogie, for which Benny Carter might have written the music and whose text might refer to Herb Jeffries.
Bo also writes about Ellington as a record producer contracted by Frank Sinatra in November 1962 to record for his newly formed Reprise Records and be its A&R man and gives us a reprint from the March issue of the Swedish jazz journal Estrad of an article written by the Swedish jazz critic Carl-Erik Lindgren about Ellington’s 1963 concerts in Lund in the south of Sweden and in Copenhagen.
Author: Ulf Lundin