Ad-Lib#3: Prima Bara Dubla

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The only official recording of Gerry Mulligan with Duke Ellington that I can think of is that of Newport 1958 in which the mind-blowing late-night call-and-response between two baritones, Mulligan and Harry Carney, in Prima Bara Dubla, repeats the memory Newport '56 in its own right. Unlike the revolution of 1956 and Paul Gonsalves' restless solo that ended all solos in his and other people's career in Ellington company, Prima Bara Dubla is a dark, reserved and unhurried conversation. If Gonsalves," by injecting a new aggressive blood to the veins of the orchestra, "made history, this one is "about history" and a commentary on that through juxtaposition of two sounds, two styles and two eras while each comment on the other: Big Band Swing reflecting Cool, and vice versa.

The liner notes of the 1958 Newport recording says: "Duke, who had been complimented so effectively all evening, paid his own compliment to Gerry Mulligan by writing a duet for Mulligan and Harry Carney, the two premier baritone saxophonists of jazz. Gerry, who made several appearances at this year's festival, including one with Marian McPartland paying tribute to Ellington earlier in the evening, came back on stage in his red jacket at this point in the programme and he and Harry took their places at the front of the stage to play Prima bara dubla, which is probably limp Spanish for a couple of first-class baritone sax men. It became a highlight of the concert and an honour both to Gerry and to Duke."

Harry Carney, Trains & Strings

Many people think adding string section to jazz was something producers forced on jazz musicians  to make their music more approachable for the average listener; making it more commercial as they used to say. Norman Granz, the legendary jazz impresario, offers an antithesis to this concept by stating that it was jazz musicians who were constantly asking for such accompaniment, believing that they can show their mastery in playing ballads - especially if they were equipped with reed instruments - by having a fluent, romantic background that string section usually endows to music.

Personally, I have nothing against romanticizing jazz, as I believe jazz is one of the last embodiments of the romantic approach to art, especially if it is executed by a giant such as Harry Carney, my favorite Baritone sax player of the first half of the 20th century.