Mercer Ellington

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Mercer Ellington in concert at the University of Rochester in 1975

Mercer Kennedy Ellington (born March 11, 1919 in Washington, DC , † February 8, 1996 in Copenhagen ) was an American jazz trumpeter , composer and arranger . He is the son of the famous composer, pianist and band leader Duke Ellington .

Life and work

Young Ellington was given musical instruction by his father. He graduated from Columbia University and the Juilliard School of Music . He wrote his first recorded piece of music, Pigeons and Peppers , when he was eighteen.

In 1939, from 1946 to 1949 and 1959 he led his own bands, whose members often continued playing with his father or became well-known musicians themselves, such as Dizzy Gillespie , Kenny Dorham , Idrees Sulieman , Chico Hamilton , Charles Mingus and Carmen McRae .
In the 1940s he wrote a few pieces that would later become jazz standards , including Things Ain't What They Used to Be , Jumpin 'Punkins , Moon Mist and Blue Serge .

He composed for his father from 1940 to 1941, spent his army service from 1943-45 in a military band under the direction of Sy Oliver and then worked as a road manager for the Cootie Williams Orchestra and as a producer for the small label Sunrise Records . In 1950 he first played as a musician with his father and later worked as a manager. In 1960 he became music director at Della Reese , in 1962 he became a disk jockey in New York City. In 1965 he returned to the Ellington Orchestra , this time as trumpeter and road manager.

After the death of his father in 1974 he took over the direction of the Duke Ellington Orchestra and went on tour with him on a European tour (1975, 1977). In 1978, Mercer Ellington, in collaboration with the critic Stanley Dance, published a biography of his father: Duke Ellington in Person: An Intimate Memoir . In the early 1980s he conducted the Duke Ellington Broadway revue Sophisticated Ladies and in 1986 participated in the performance of the Duke Ellington opera Queenie Pie . In the late 1980s he moved to Denmark, where he largely withdrew from musical life. In 1988 his album Digital Duke ( GRP ) won a Grammy Award .

Mercer Ellington's son, Edward, played with the Ellington Orchestra in the late 1970s . His younger son, Paul, took over the orchestra after his death. His daughter Mercedes is a dancer and choreographer.

Ellington died of heart failure shortly before his seventy-seventh birthday .

Discography as band leader (selection)

Ricky Ford and Mercer Ellington 1975
  • Stepping into Swing Society ( Coral Records , 1959)
  • Colors in Rhythm (Coral, 1959)
  • Black and Tan Fantasy , 1958/59 ( MCA Records , 1973)
  • Hot and Bothered (Doctor Jazz, 1985)

with the Duke Ellington Orchestra

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Ellington, Mercer
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Ellington, Mercer Kennedy (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American jazz musician, composer and arranger
DATE OF BIRTH March 11, 1919
PLACE OF BIRTH Washington, DC
DATE OF DEATH February 8, 1996
Place of death Copenhagen