Duke Ellington: Live at Cornell University, 1948

Duke Ellington THE CORNELL UNIVERSITY CONCERT liner notes

1948 was a bad year for big bands. Another AFM recording ban gave singers a second opportunity to gain popularity at the expense of musicians and instrumental music. The Duke Ellington band, in fact, did not enjoy a regular record session in the entire year, the recorded evidence of its existence deriving from broadcasts or concerts such as this. Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, was eighty years old in 1948, but it evidently had a hip, young student body, for it gave Ellington a warm, enthusiastic welcome. The previous month, his band had played its annual Carnegie Hall concert to a capacity audience, but in between there had been some disappointments. "Variety," for example, reported "bad biz" .. when the band played the big Syria Mosque auditorium in Pittsburgh, and questioned whether the public was losing interest in jazz concerts. Cornell's reception proved the contrary, and Ellington responded with rich programs.