EMMY AWARD-WINNING NADY SYSTEMS JOINS THE CENTER FOR JAZZ ARTS TO SUPPORT THE IMPORTANT WORK OF THE DUKE ELLINGTON SOCIETY Through its ongoing promotion of expanded dialog throughout the music and arts communities, the Center for Jazz Arts brings a new channel of public/private collaboration. June 30, 2004 Los Angeles --- In a cooperative initiative with the Center for Jazz Arts, NADY Systems Inc., an Emmy Award-winning technology firm based in Northern California, has provided a greatly needed in-kind donation of public address equipment to the Duke Ellington Society (Los Angeles). Founded by former USC educator Dr. William Fawcett Hill, and continuously serving the local community since 1988, the Duke Ellington Society (DES) of Southern California is an independently operated, public benefit organization devoted to advancing the public understanding of Duke Ellington and his music. Maintaining many closely-tied activities with other independently organized Ellington societies throughout the United States and Europe, the DES hosts monthly gatherings bringing together a wide cross-section of the Los Angeles community, and publishes a free quarterly newsletter offering reporting and scholarship from members, affiliates, historians, and the general public, representing an important chronicle of American culture throughout the past century. Throughout his lifetime, the creative legacy and musical genius of Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington (born April 29, 1899 in Washington, D.C., died May 24, 1974 in New York City) served to mark nearly every milestone in American and African-American history of the twentieth-century. Born into a musical family, with both parents accomplished pianists, Ellington began his own piano studies at the age of seven, and completed his first musical composition by age fourteen. Performing professionally by age seventeen, he would eventually begin leading his own group by nineteen. Through his skills in the visual arts, the young Ellington would receive a scholarship offer to the Pratt Institute for Fine Arts, in New York, but his passion for the "ragtime" piano playing he had heard throughout his childhood, in early twentieth-century Washington, would lead him to a different path. Quickly establishing his reputation as a leading, young, musical talent, Ellington would soon begin refining his natural gift for harmony under the tutelage of classically-trained musician Henry Grant, while at the same time immersing himself in intensive instruction in musical theory and practice with the popular, Washington bandleader Oliver Perry. With his combination of natural talent, passion to excel, and driving creative vision, Ellington's next stage of musical development would lead him to New York City, and take place in the midst of New York's "Harlem Renaissance." Harlem in the 1920s was home to groundbreaking African-American authors such as Claude McKay, W.E.B. Du Bois, and Langston Hughes, as well as to innovative, African-American, visual artists such as Aaron Douglas, Romare Bearden, William H. Johnson, Archibald Motley, Jacob Lawrence, and many others. During this complex period in America's cultural development, and despite ongoing racial conflicts that characterized the era, African-American music and entertainment became an inseparable part of the spirit of the time, and new musicals such as "Shuffle Along" (1921), by Eubie Blake and Noble Sissle, featuring an all-black cast, were soon overwhelming sensations on Broadway. Moving to New York in 1923, Ellington quickly became a part of that city's thriving community of African-American musicians, poets, painters, and stage performers, and would soon contribute his trademark original songs and musical arrangements to bandleader Sam Wooding's, all-black, 1925, "Chocolate Kiddies Revue," as it prepared to give European audiences one of their earliest, first-hand introductions to black-American performers and musical artists. In May of 1925, Wooding's revue premiered in the German capital of Berlin and, among many other significant, European developments to follow, would irreversibly influence the life of a young Berlin music-enthusiast named Alfred Lion. Eventually moving to New York himself, some ten years later, Alfred Lion would forever carry the experience of that 1925 revue with him, and would in-turn go on to establish one of the most respected, and influential, jazz recording labels in the world (legendary "Blue Note Records"). From 1927 to 1932, while working at New York's "Cotton Club," Ellington's achievements as a composer and bandleader began to attract even broader national and international attention. In the years from 1932 to 1942, historians and critics alike would regard Duke Ellington's considerable output of original music as, perhaps, some of the finest of his career. In June of 1933, Ellington would eventually embark on his first trip overseas, to England, where the leading British conductors, artists, critics, and columnists of the time enthusiastically received his musical genius, and throughout his brief, two-month stay he would become immediately and openly befriended by both Prince Edward and Prince George. As story has it, on numerous occasions during The Ellington Orchestra's 1933 tour of England, Britain's royalty could be found demonstrating their own passions for both jazz piano and jazz drums, into the early hours of the morning, alongside Ellington and his band. His initial experience in 1933 England would later be followed by a long list of official diplomatic tours, throughout his lifetime. In the years following World War II, Duke Ellington would continue his role as a popular icon in the worlds of film and television by both appearing in and providing the musical backdrop for a wide variety of Hollywood projects. His earlier acceptance as a mainstream entertainer of the day had previously found him a part of numerous "Soundies," for the Panoram visual jukebox, as well as a part of numerous, early musical shorts and full-length features for leading Hollywood studios such as Paramount Pictures. In 1947, Ellington would then continue his long relationship with Paramount in an eight-minute, animated work by legendary film director George Pal, entitled "A Date with Duke." Widely considered as one of the most groundbreaking contributions to the field of stop-motion animation, and first developed as early as 1937, George Pal had created a new animation process called "Puppetoons" that the much beloved Ellington would soon become a celebrated part of. The result of an amazingly detailed process, Puppetoons all averaged eight-minutes in length, and required some 30000 single frames of film, as well as some 9000 individually "hand-carved" wooden figures for each frame. Similar in production style to that of a two-dimensional, hand-drawn cartoon, each production would be storyboarded, with every shot individually sketched-out, and detailed decisions would be made regarding each element of set-design and musical score. Color drawings would then be rendered of the main characters, in every sequence, as well as of each of their movements. The drawings were then photographed to ensure the smoothness of the action, while weeks of meticulous woodcarving work would be done, and complete sets (with props) would be constructed in miniature. Finally, a pre-recorded music soundtrack would guide the single-frame photography while editing, synchronization, and other post-production work completed the process. At the peak of their popularity, a single Puppetoon was completed in approximately forty-five days and carried with it an equivalent cost (by today's standards) of several million dollars (for an eight-minute film). Soon after Ellington's Hollywood career had led him to experience the groundbreaking field of Puppetoons (as well as the earlier field of jukebox Soundies), the increasing popularity of television would find him as a favorite choice for what had then become the very first, short (three-minute), musical films made specifically for television, known as "Snader Telescriptions." With the overall themes of Snader Telescriptions intersecting the entire musical landscape, the vast majority would showcase the leading performers of the day, of which Duke Ellington was now one of the most recognized in the world. Throughout the 1960s, Duke Ellington would continue to apply his musical genius to the fields of filmmaking, television, and theatre, and would ultimately receive an Academy Award nomination for his captivating, original score to the 1961 film "Paris Blues." The story of two American jazz artists caught-up in the romantic world of 1960s Paris (played by actors Sidney Poitier and Paul Newman), "Paris Blues" also includes a brief and inspiring cameo appearance by the great Louis Armstrong. Throughout his gifted lifetime, Ellington received numerous awards, doctoral degrees, and honors, including a Pulitzer Prize nomination for his extensive contribution to the advancement of American popular culture around the world. In 1965, ten years prior to his death, Edward "Duke" Ellington was finally awarded the highest honor able to be bestowed upon an American civilian, the Congressional Medal of Freedom. About the Duke Ellington Society of Southern California: The DES is a not-for-profit public benefit organization that supports its activities largely through annual membership dues and monthly donations provided during regular public events. In its ongoing commitment to advancing the Ellington legacy in all its forms, the DES also provides financial and community-based support to the LAUSD's Duke Ellington High School, in South Los Angeles. Through the generous, in-kind assistance of the Los Angeles Teacher's Union, the majority of DES activities are held at the union's Wilshire Boulevard facilities. For more information contact: Darroch Greer, Editor Duke Ellington Society of Southern California (323) 467-5731 darroch@sodbusterpictures.com About NADY Systems Inc.: Designing, manufacturing, and marketing wireless microphones since 1976, Nady Systems is continuing its tradition of research and innovation, and is further expanding its role in the professional audio arena. In 1996, Nady was recognized by the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences with an Emmy Award for "Outstanding Technical Achievement" in wireless microphone technology. For more information contact: Toby Nady, President NADY Systems Inc. (510) 652- 2411 tnady@nady.com About the CJA: Established in 2004, the Center for Jazz Arts is an international institution devoted to the study and advancement of American jazz culture throughout the visual, literary, and classical arts, around the world. Through its primary operations in Los Angeles, it is building a prominent new platform of engagement for students, artists, educators, and the broader public, from every generation. For more information contact: Public Relations Center for Jazz Arts (866) 950-5200 info@centerforjazzarts.com [ back to top ]