Duke Ellington was a bandleader and musical director, pianist, in-house composer and arranger for his own big band, he left behind around 2000 works, composed film scores, for revue theatre and show stages, but also for the classical concert hall. He combined jazz with elements of the Western European musical avant-garde of the time as well as the classical-romantic tradition and thus became one of the pioneers of the ‘Third Stream’.

This tribute concert was performed and recorded as part of Musikfest Berlin on 16 September 2024. The programme features some of his greatest hits from the big band era as well as compositions from his later creative period such as ‘Night Creature’ and ‘A Tone Parallel to Harlem’: works that made him one of the founders of the ‘Third Stream’, that typically American combination of jazz with elements of European symphonic music and classical modernism.

The Big Band of the Deutsche Oper Berlin has long made a name for its outstanding jazz interpretations. Fola Dada's powerful, versatile voice may still be familiar to you as she was a vocal coach on German hit TV talent show ‘Deutschland Sucht den Superstar’. In 2022, she won the German Jazz Award in the ‘Vocal’ category. Saxophonist Tony Lakatos has been a permanent fixture on the jazz scene for many years. His recording of ‘Porgy and Bess’ with the Frankfurt Radio Big Band won the German Record Award in 2009. He regularly plays in the hottest jazz clubs around the world.

The song ‘The Famous Duke’ (2024) was composed for big band and orchestra by chief conductor Manfred Honetschläger and premiered on this concert recording.