Stories from the Edge of Music #59: THE CANADIAN WHO PLAYED IN DUKE ELLINGTON’S ORCHESTRA
Plus, non-musical musings about the end of WWII
Fred Stone was one of the best session musicians in Canada in the sixties. His peers said that if the chart in front of him was in Arabic and upside down, he could play it.
And he was one of the only Canadians ever to be a member of one of the greatest — and longest lasting — jazz orchestras in American history. Duke Ellington himself wrote (or collaborated on) more than 1,000 compositions, ranging from three-minute pop tunes — many of which are still played today, 50 years after his death — to Broadway musicals to film scores and semi-symphonic suites.
Ellington was also a (still) underestimated pianist, a visionary arranger, and one of the most laissez faire band leaders ever — provided that the music his players delivered, night after night, after night was perfect.
I did a long interview with Stone, and wrote a story for The Canadian Composer/Le compositeur canadien back in 1970, and thanks to SOCAN’s communications director Howard Druckman, who found this for me, I’m offering you an updated, revised and edited version of it, a mere 55 years later!
This is Part 1; there’ll be more Ellington trivia next time, which (I promise) will be in your inbox in a couple of weeks.
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WAS THIS JUST ANOTHER ROUTINE SESSION, OR WAS IT AN AUDITION?
Back in the late ’60s, Freddie Stone was the king of Canadian session musicians. Based in Toronto, he played trumpet and flugelhorn, and took part in dozens — no, hundreds — of recording sessions. He did advertising jingles and played with big bands and small groups. He accompanied pop singers and operatic divas. He played with classical ensembles, rock bands and jazz groups.
At a time when there were few studios in town, Stone played in every one of them. He was always on time and ready to play whatever was on the music stand in front of him.
So, responding to a request to add another horn part for a Duke Ellington session, he reported at 10 a.m. to the Sound Canada studio in Don Mills. Apart from the engineer, Terry Brown, and an assistant, the room was empty.
Half an hour later, two members of the band showed up with a bottle of wine and started a card game. Little by little, other members arrived — some slept on chairs, others sipped whiskey.
And then, at noon, Ellington himself walked into the studio. “Take ten, everybody,” he announced.
“Where would you like the microphones?” Terry Brown asked. “I have no idea,” Ellington told him, “That’s your job. My job is to write the music.”
Stone recalled: “It was really sadistic. The first thing they gave out is one of the toughest numbers in the book, something from an Ellington sacred piece called Kicks, a really fast, up-tempo thing. I was experienced enough to take it in stride, and we did it in one take.
“Then we did another thing, a simple number but demanding a fair bit of improvisation, and that went okay.
“After that I’m putting my horn away and Duke stops me and says ‘Will you come along?’ I figured he meant for a beer or something so I asked, ‘Where?’ and he said ‘Everywhere…’
“The next day they sent me a plane ticket to Chicago and a couple of hundred dollars as an advance.”
Fred Stone was now a member of the Duke Ellington Orchestra.
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Playing in the band
At first, playing in Ellington’s band was not easy. Stone was the only member who wasn’t African American. And he sat in the trumpet section between Cootie Williams and Cat Anderson, both of whom had been with Ellington for decades, and had never exchanged a civil word with each other.
“For the first few weeks, I was the only guy who didn’t know the book. Duke would look at the audience and say, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, “Rockin’ in Rhythm,”’ and boom, the band’s into it. And I’m frantically searching through the book, a huge collection of charts, and I’m saying ‘My god, it’s not there!’ And the number’s half-finished by the time I’ve found it.”
But after a few weeks, he had learned the whole repertoire. “Look, Duke started that book in 1925 or so, and he’d been adding to it ever since, and there’s not much he’d thrown out.”
Ellington remained an enigmatic figure even for his musicians. He rarely saw the band off stage; he travelled separately, usually with his friend Harry Carney, the baritone sax player who had been in the band since its very beginning. The most extended time the band saw him was on stage. He would arrive, Stone told me, “from god knows where, once we were on stage. He’d start the show with a wave of his hand and a greeting to the audience, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, we love you madly…’”
The best story that illustrates Ellington’s relationship with his players involved Julian Priester, one of the trombonists. Recalled Stone: “Julian had been in the band for four months, and Ellington had never said a single word to him.
“Finally, the band’s standing on the platform at a railway station in Tangiers, and Ellington goes up to him and says, every quietly, ‘Julien, you should never show an Arab the bottom of your feet’ — and walked away. It blew the poor guy’s mind.”
Stone figured that in his first three months with the band, he had spoken with Ellington only half a dozen times. “After three weeks playing section parts, I asked him whether he could give me some solos to play. He looked at me and said, ‘What do you want, some old Clark Terry charts to play?’ I thought, that’ll teach me to open my big mouth.
“And then he wrote an important part of his New Orleans Suite for me.” Later in Milan, Ellington recorded two compositions Stone had written before he joined the band.
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Five Ellington records you have to hear
Last time I checked, I had more than 80 Duke Ellington records — maybe half his recorded output.
Here are the ones you need to have:
• Early Recordings of Ellington Classics — from the mid-’20s, here are the first recordings of “Black and Tan Fantasy,” “East St. Louis Toodle-O,” “The Mooch,” and “Jubilee Stomp.” (A second volume includes “Rockin’ in Rhythm” and “Mood Indigo.”)
• Fargo 1940 — a bootleg recording, now generally available, of a dance date in North Dakota.
• Ellington at Newport — sometimes I think this 1956 live session was the first rock and roll record; certainly “Diminuendo and Crescendo in Blue” featuring an epic tenor sax solo by Paul Gonsalves is a precursor of what was to come.
• Ellington 55 — one of the best bands Ellington ever had, in storming form on classics like “Stompin’ at the Savoy,” “Honeysuckle Rose,” “One O’Clock Jump,” and “Flying Home.”
• The Count Meets the Duke — a unique collaboration between the Ellington Orchestra and the Count Basie Band. Play this one LOUD!
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CAN’T WAIT FOR THIS FESTIVAL!
Chris Frayer, the Winnipeg Folk Festival’s programmer, has done an amazing job. Gillian Welch! Allison Russell! Ani diFranco! Bruce Cockburn! Blackie and the Rodeo Kings! And to top it all off, MAVIS STAPLES!
Needless to say, thanks to Chris, I’ll be there and will report here!
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CAN YOU ADD TO THIS LIST OF HEROES AND VILLAINS?
When he published this chart a couple of weeks ago, he said folks could share it, and I’m delighted to turn you on to it if you missed it.
Please let me know if you can add some more “heroes” and “villains” to Ted’s list.
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And next time…
Next time, the second part of the Fred Stone’s story about Duke Ellington, some folk festival news, a quick B.B. King story, and a special interview with a pioneer behind-the-scenes woman — I call her a maker of stage magic.
And behind the paywall for my 100+ paid subscribers, some personal stuff, this time about how well I get along with little kids. Down the line, I might even tell you about how I lost my virginity in a brothel in Milan, and you can’t get more personal than that.
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Behind the paywall this time: non-musical musings
The end of World War II.
Economic uncertainty: Sex workers know it!
This week’s Trump invective.
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