DUKE ELLINGTON

Born on April 29, 1899, in Washington, D.C., he grew up among that citys substantial offensive middle class. His m opposite, Daisy Kennedy, was the daughter of a District of Columbia patrol captain. Daisy married the ambitious fresh James Edward Ellington, who was successively a coachman, butler, caterer, and blueprint draftsman. J.E., as Duke called his father, interminably acted as though he had money, whether he had it or not. He raised his family as though he were a millionaire Ellington had a happy childhood, from which he emerged pissed off and whole: He was an animated athlete, a bit of a bookworm, but not oftentimes interested in directwork. In the only music ground level that appears on his high shoal transcript, he got a D. except when he learned, as he later put it, that when you were play easy there was invariably a pretty girlfriend standing down at the bass clef end of the piano he dedicated himself to keyboard technique. By his mid-teens, Duke (the nickname came from a persnickety junior high cultivate friend who liked to introduce his pals titles) was hanging out at Frank Hollidays pool means on T Street, a magnet for Pullman porters, pool sharks, and the citys scoop piano players. And the kid watched. And listened. Soon he had his own band.

Offered a learning to the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn (he was a visual artist of well-nigh promise), the eighteen-year-old Duke turned it down he was making too frequently money as a dance band entrepreneur, displace out four or five groups a night. In 1918 he married Edna Thompson. In 1919 a son, Mercer, was born. The marriage shortly foundered, and though Duke and Edna never divorced, they seldom saw each other after the mid-twenties. In 1923 Ellington and his fellow musicians lad Greer... If you want to get a full essay, order it on our website: Ordercustompaper.com

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