Stan Kenton on "Music 55" Guests include Yehudi Menuhin, Duke Ellington and Ann Richards See www.allthingsk... for much more info, including complete personnel and other episodes.
amazing priceless footage, musical heroes of the 20 century and beyond for those of us who enjoy listening to music real music.....don't get me started!!!!
Priceless! Not only do we here the sublime "Come Sunday" with Duke and Yehudi Menuhin but also Duke's witty "Monologue." (AKA "Pretty and the Wolf.") Also the then or soon-to-be Mrs. Kenton. (The choreography now looks like something from a parody of 50s television as seen on SNL, but no matter.)
Thank you for this fascinating glimpse of Ellingtonia, which was shown on July 26. Monologue was a story by Duke, but the music was written by his clarinetist, Jimmy Hamilton. The cartoon background illustrations were by Andy Warhol. Wonderful to see Ellington act it, even if the cartoon is a few seconds ahead of him. What we call "Come Sunday" now, Ellington then referred to as the "Spiritual theme". Menuhin memorized it for this show, and look at Duke's attentive support. The other two Menuhin pieces (Falla and Debussy) are also nice to see. There were ten shows in this series and Kenton conducted a local studio orchestra, prepared by first Gil Fuller and then Johnny Richards.
