Appearing in the Grand Hall of the Moscow Conservatory on Friday, January 23, the prima will perform That's the Blues to the music and lyrics of Duke Ellington.
"This is the most sensual fragment of the Black, Brown and Beige suite that Ellington first performed 61 years ago, in January 1943, in the Carnegie Hall," Alexei Batashev, Russia's famous jazz historian, said in an interview with RIA Novosti. "Then all the funds from the concert were channelled to the Fund for Assistance to the Red Army. That's the Blues and the entire suite will be first performed in accordance with the score of that historic concert, i.e. in full, which will make it a world's premiere because in the past it was only performed in fragments." It is also a premiere for David Berger's band because they will perform the famous Rhapsody in Blue by George Gershwin on the basis of the symphonic score of Oleg Lundstrem, a living legend of Russian jazz, who has been acknowledged Ellington's successor in the US.
The well-known Rhapsody will also be played by famous Russian pianist Nikolai Petrov accompanied by the US jazz band.
