Duke Ellington Presents The Dollar Brand Trio (Japanese Reprise Vinyl LP)

Vinyl: VG+
Sleeve: EX
Obi: EX

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Duke Ellington Presents The Dollar Brand Trio | Vinyl LP - Japanese Reprise Records Reissue (P-6122R, Jazz-Forever Series)

In February 1963, Sathima Bea Benjamin convinced Duke Ellington to visit a small club in Zurich where her partner Dollar Brand was playing piano with a trio. Ellington stayed, and by the end of the set he had agreed to arrange a recording session. Brand, Gertze and Ntshoko flew to Paris. They recorded six tracks in a single day. The album that resulted was the first international exposure for a pianist whose style combined the church hymns and township melodies of Cape Town with the harmonic language of Thelonious Monk and Ellington himself. "Dollar's Dance" and "Kippi" (named for Kippie Moeketsi, the alto saxophonist who played in Brand's South African group the Jazz Epistles alongside Hugh Masekela) are built on simple, repeating melodic figures that accumulate weight through repetition rather than complexity. "Ubu Suku" is slower and darker, with Brand playing sustained, ringing chords over Gertze's bowed bass. "Brilliant Corners," the Monk composition, is the one piece drawn from outside Brand's own writing, and its angularity sits naturally beside his originals. "The Stride" closes the album with a nod to the piano tradition Ellington grew up in.

Brand was 28 and had left South Africa the year before. He and Benjamin had settled temporarily in Zurich with almost no money. The Ellington connection changed everything. After this album's release, Ellington arranged for Brand to play the Newport Jazz Festival in 1965, and in 1966 Brand substituted for Ellington on five dates, leading the Ellington Orchestra. He later converted to Islam and changed his name to Abdullah Ibrahim, the name under which he has recorded and performed for the past five decades. Gertze and Ntshoko, both South Africans in exile, were Brand's working rhythm section in Europe during this period.

This is the Japanese reissue on Reprise P-6122R from the Jazz-Forever series, manufactured for Warner-Pioneer Corporation. The release date is not well documented; the original price, catalogue prefix and Warner-Pioneer credit means it's likely late 1970s/early 1980s.