Harlem Air Shaft - Duke Ellington, Jimmie Blanton, and Ben Webster - This Day in.Jazz July 22nd
"Harlem Air Shaft" is a piece of music composed by American jazz composer and musician Duke Ellington, first recorded for RCA Victor and released in 1940. Featured in 38 recordings since, it was a popular piece in both Ellington's repertoire and among jazz trumpeters such as Clark Terry. It is generally considered programmatic by some composers and scholars, acting as a narration of everyday noises heard in 1930s New York City.
Ellington recounted his inspiration in a 1944 interview published in The New Yorker:
So much goes on in a Harlem air shaft. You get the full essence of Harlem in an air shaft. You hear fights, you smell dinner, you hear people making love. You hear intimate gossip floating down. You hear the radio. An air shaft is one great big loudspeaker. You see your neighbor’s laundry. You hear the janitor’s dogs. The man upstairs’ aerial falls down and breaks your window. You smell coffee. A wonderful thing is that smell. An air shaft has got every contrast. One guy is cooking dried fish with rice and another guy’s got a great big turkey. Guy-with-fish’s wife is a terrific cooker but the guy’s wife with the turkey is doing a sad job. You hear people praying, fighting, snoring. Jitterbugs are jumping up and down always over you, never below you. That’s a funny thing about jitterbugs. They’re always over you. I tried to put all that in "Harlem Air Shaft."
Harlem Air Shaft: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aJYU_zNkbmQ
Ellington/Blanton duo, J.B. Blues: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5JlyMlZS9IA
Body and Soul: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aeD7hkJPzpU
Jack the Bear: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eTbXap_H22E
Stardust with Jimmie Blanton and Ben Webster - must listen! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDtBsBX7KoY
Great blog by Mike Zirpolo: https://swingandbeyond.com/2018/04/11/harlem-air-shaft-1940-duke-ellington-live-version/
-
1:19:51
Bright Insight
14 hours agoRare ‘UNKNOWN METAL’ Discovered in Egyptian Stone Box!?
85.8K134 -
9:52
Tundra Tactical
20 hours ago $0.07 earnedIsrael Takes the Party Back to 1989!
2982 -
19:26
Cody and Kellie
2 hours agoHot Springs Bathhouse: A Relaxing Retreat
41 -
9:02
Dr. Nick Zyrowski
10 hours agoIntermittent Fasting Linked To Cardiovascular Death? New Study
4592 -
10:40
Bearing
1 hour agoKamala Harris CRINGE Ads Review | "Be A Man, Vote For A Woman"
935 -
20:12
Danny Haiphong
10 hours agoNasrallah is GONE: Israel’s SHOCKING Beirut Strike Stuns Hezbollah, All Out War Next?
1.33K5 -
46:14
Squaring The Circle, A Randall Carlson Podcast
1 day ago#021 Hyper Velocity Impacts and Human Civilization Cosmic Encounters of the Holocene Pt 2
2.01K14 -
53:52
hickok45
5 hours agoSunday Shoot-a-Round # 248
1.01K9 -
5:05
Colion Noir
16 hours agoKamala Harris Fought The Supreme Court To Prevent Citizens From Owning Handguns
7K14 -
18:52
Bright Insight
15 hours agoThe Great Pyramid HIDDEN Chamber is Now a Conspiracy
161K99