Terry Teachout, the drama critic at The Wall Street Journal, is the author of Pops: A Life of Louis Armstrong and Satchmo at the Waldorf, a one-man play about Armstrong's life and times. He lives in New York City.
"Compelling narrative flow...poised impartiality. . . .Teachout
writes in an earthbound style marked by sound scholarship and easy
readability. . . . Duke humanizes a man whom history has kept on a
pedestal."
--The New York Times Book Review "A thoroughly researched
homage...Teachout delivers a Duke unlike any we've seen in previous
biographies...At last, Teachout affirms that music was Ellington's
greatest mistress - and to her, the composer was unrelentingly
loyal."
--Essence Magazine "Comprehensive and
well-researched...important....[an] entertaining and valuable
biography."
--Booklist, Starred Review "Teachout gives much insight into
Ellington's life, personality, working habits, and compositions.
This work should appeal to Ellington enthusiasts as well as casual
jazz fans."
--Library Journal "Revealing...Teachout neatly balances colorful
anecdote with shrewd character assessments and musicological
analysis, and he manages to debunk Ellington's self-mythologizing,
while preserving his stature as the man who caught jazz's ephemeral
genius in a bottle."
--Publishers Weekly "Terry Teachout's biography is destined to be
the definitive biography of bandleader, composer, and complex
man--Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington."
--The American Rag One of The Daily Beast's Fall 2013
Must-Reads
Chosen as a Top 10 Music Book by Publishers Weekly Praise for DUKE
"Compelling narrative flow...poised impartiality. . . .Teachout
writes in an earthbound style marked by sound scholarship and easy
readability. . . . DUKE humanizes a man whom history has kept on a
pedestal."
-The New York Times Book Review "A thorough and fascinating
portrait."
-USA Today
"[a] grand and engrossing biography...Thanks to this frank and
sympathetic biography--whose every page is studded with sharp
phrases and keen insights--we now seem to know Duke Ellington as
well as we ever will or need to."
--San Francisco Chronicle "Teachout adroitly chronicles how
Ellington coaxed from his ensemble such timeless hits as "Mood
Indigo." And he adeptly evokes the personalities of the ducal
band..."
--The Economist "an impressively lucid, compact narrative"
--The Boston Globe
"A thoroughly researched homage...Teachout delivers a Duke unlike
any we've seen in previous biographies...At last, Teachout affirms
that music was Ellington's greatest mistress - and to her, the
composer was unrelentingly loyal."
-Essence Magazine
"Swinging."
-Elle Magazine
"This well-researched biography is sure to appeal to longtime jazz
fans who revel in their memories of Ellington's work and others who
may want to learn more about his fascinating life."
-Associated Press
"Mr Teachout adroitly chronicles how Ellington coaxed from his
ensemble such timeless hits as 'Mood Indigo'. . . . evokes the
personalities of the ducal band."
-The Economist
"Descriptively rich, the book is not so much a scholarly tome as it
is a delightful and entertaining read. Teachout writes with clarity
and verve, presenting an astonishing amount of detail in a flowing
narrative that brings to life not just Ellington and his music, but
much of American culture of the period."
-National Review
"[A] grand and engrossing biography...Thanks to this frank and
sympathetic biography - whose every page is studded with sharp
phrases and keen insights - we now seem to know Duke Ellington as
well as we ever will or need to."
-San Francisco Chronicle
"Teachout's exhaustive mining of archives, including a number of
unpublished memoirs of some of the principals in his story, gives
the musical history in Duke an impressive heft." -The Milwaukee
Journal Sentinel
"By penetrating behind the curtain, this author has delivered a
book that even those who think they know Ellington will need to
read."
-Dallas Morning News
"Teachout does a commendable job of contextualizing Ellington's
career." -Austin Chronicle
"The definitive Ellington biography thus far...valuable...[one of]
the most important books of 2013."
-The Buffalo News
"Teachout captures the breadth of [Duke's] life... with verve and
insight."
-The Huffington Post
"Teachout's book, as in the case of his earlier one on Armstrong,
is the masterwork." - Jazz Journal "Dimensional, thoughtful, and
rigorously researched, Duke is an enthralling read from cover to
cover."
-BrainPickings.org"Teachout...bring[s] a worthy level of
scholarship to the telling of the notoriously secretive Ellington's
life."
-The Virginia Quarterly Review (Online) "With this exhaustive,
engaging study of the greatest jazz composer of his era, Wall
Street Journal drama critic Teachout solidifies his place as one of
America's great music biographers." - Kirkus, Starred Review
"Comprehensive and well-researched...important....[an] entertaining
and valuable biography."
- Booklist, Starred Review
"Teachout gives much insight into Ellington's life, personality,
working habits, and compositions. This work should appeal to
Ellington enthusiasts as well as casual jazz fans."
- Library Journal
"Revealing...Teachout neatly balances colorful anecdote with shrewd
character assessments and musicological analysis, and he manages to
debunk Ellington's self-mythologizing, while preserving his stature
as the man who caught jazz's ephemeral genius in a bottle." -
Publishers Weekly
"Terry Teachout's biography is destined to be the definitive
biography of bandleader, composer, and complex man--Edward Kennedy
"Duke" Ellington."
- The American Rag "a fascinating account...Teachout gives us a
rich portrait of the man, his music and his era.. "
--Tampa Bay Tribune
Praise for Pops; A Life of Louis Armstrong: "Teachout restores this
jazzman to his deserved place in the pantheon of American
artists."
-The New York Times "Thirty-eight years after Louis Armstrong's
death, Terry Teachout has made the possible, possible: He has
written a definitive narrative biography of the greatest jazz
musician of the twentieth century."
-San Francisco Chronicle
"A masterpiece."
-Seattle Times
"Teachout excels at conveying the interplay between Armstrong the
artist and Armstrong the entertainer, and at examining the
particular challenge of his legacy."
-The New Yorker
"[An] exceptional biography... Upon finishing this definitive
biography, the reader is instructed to flip to the discography,
download every last song, listen and grin the hell back."
-The Washington Post
Amazon Best Books of the Month, December 2009
"Crafted with a musician's ear and an historian's eye, Pops is a
vibrant biography of the iconic Louis Armstrong that resonates with
the same warmth as ol' Satchmo's distinctive voice. Wall Street
Journal critic Terry Teachout draws from a wealth of previously
unavailable material - including over 650 reels of Armstrong's own
personal tape recordings - to create an engaging profile that slips
behind the jazz legend's megawatt smile. Teachout reveals that the
beaming visage of "Reverend Satchelmouth" was not a mark of racial
subservience, but a clear symbol of Louis's refusal to let anything
cloud the joy he derived from blowing his horn. "Faced with the
terrible realities of the time and place into which he had been
born," explains Teachout, "he didn't repine, but returned love for
hatred and sought salvation in work." Armstrong was hardly
impervious to the injustices of his era, but in his mind, nothing
was more sacred than the music.
-Dave Callanan
"Teachout turns to another mighty pillar of 20th-century American
culture, Louis Armstrong, a black man born at the turn of the
century in the poorest quarter of New Orleans who by the end of his
life was known and loved in every corner of the earth. ... Teachout
brings a fresh perspective... Teachout's portrait reminds us why we
fell in love with Armstrong's music in the first place."
-Publishers Weekly Starred Review
"To this fine, exhaustively researched...biography, Teachout brings
an insider's knowledge--he was a jazz musician before launching a
career as cultural critic and biographer."
-National Post The Afterword "No one does better in exploring
Armstrong's social context than Teachout."
-Montreal Gazette
A Conversation with TERRY TEACHOUT, author of DUKE Exactly how
important a composer was Duke Ellington?
Ellington was the most important jazz composer of the twentieth
century, and one of the greatest composers in any genre of music.
Not only was he a major composer of purely instrumental music, but
he wrote some of the century's most successful popular songs,
including "Mood Indigo" and "Sophisticated Lady," many of which
continue to this day to be performed and recorded. No jazz composer
has left a deeper mark on world culture. What kind of a person was
he in private life? Was he trustworthy? Loyal? Honest?
That's a tricky question! Like many geniuses, Ellington was almost
entirely self-centered, though his selfishness didn't exclude
kindness and benevolence--on his own terms. But a fair number of
his sidemen considered him unscrupulous, and I can't say that I
blame them for feeling that way. Was Ellington as great a lover as
he's said to have been?
Even greater, by all accounts. Throughout his life Ellington was
catnip to women, and he rarely said "no" when they invited him into
their beds. I didn't even try to count his lovers--I can't count
that high. Did Ellington really write all of his hit songs and
instrumental compositions--or did he have unacknowledged
collaborators?
He had many unacknowledged collaborators, starting with Billy
Strayhorn, his closest musical associate. He wasn't a plagiarist,
but to an extent that's not generally realized or fully understood
by most of his fans, Ellington created his music
collectively--though he was always the auteur, the man who made the
ultimate decisions, and he was solely responsible for writing most
of his major instrumental pieces. On the other hand, bits and
pieces of the melodies of most of his big pop hits were written by
his sidemen. To be sure, he usually gave credit where it was due,
but not always, and he tried whenever possible to buy those bits
and pieces for flat fees instead of cutting his collaborators in on
the songwriting royalties. What effect did Ellington's middle-class
family background have on his personality and music?
It was absolutely central to his personality--as well as to his
music. Ellington saw himself as a member of the light-skinned black
bourgeoisie, an elegant, cultivated gentleman who insisted on being
taken seriously by the white world and performing not only in
nightclubs but in concert halls. For the uninitiated, what should
be the three Ellington songs one should listen to first? Why?
I'd start with "Ko-Ko," Ellington's most perfect instrumental
composition, written and recorded in 1940. It's an explosively
dynamic blues that comes as close as any record can to summing him
up in three minutes. Then I'd choose the original 1930 recording of
"Mood Indigo," which shows us Ellington in a quiet, pensive mood.
Last of all, I'd opt for the frenzied live recording of "Diminuendo
and Crescendo in Blue" that he made in 1956 at the Newport Jazz
Festival. Not only will that give you a taste of Ellington's
large-scale compositions, but it's of enormous historical
importance as well, for its popular success shaped the last part of
his life. What was the most surprising fact you came across in your
research of his life?
Speaking as a musician and a scholar, I was most surprised by the
extent of his borrowings from other musicians. I knew he was in the
habit of doing so, but I didn't fully realize the extent to which
his compositional process was shaped by his need to
collaborate--which arose in large part from the fact that he found
it difficult to write memorable tunes. (I'll admit, though, that
the details of his very enthusiastic sex life occasionally
surprised me as well!) How did Duke get that scar on his face? Why
was he so ashamed to show it?
Edna, his wife, attacked him with a razor when she found out in
1929 that he was sleeping with Fredi Washington, a beautiful black
actress. I think he was ashamed of the scar because he hated the
idea of anyone knowing that he'd ever been at the mercy of a woman.
He had enormously complicated feelings about women, a fascinating
mixture of attraction, hatred, and--above all--distrust. Now that
you've extensively researched Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong,
who do you have more of an affinity for? Why?
Again, that's a tricky question. Louis Armstrong was clearly the
more likable man, in part because his personality was so completely
open and unguarded. Ellington, however, was far more intriguing,
for the opposite reason: he only showed you what he wanted you to
see, and nothing more. I guess I'd have to say that I would have
preferred to be Armstrong's friend--though I think it would have
been great fun to hang out with Ellington on occasion. I'm not sure
I would have wanted to work for him, though.
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