mystery pacific by ellington?

daddyfruit

I was surprised to hear the Duke Ellington Orchestra playing the intro to Mystery Pacific (starting at about 1:05):



Both this film and Django's recording are dated 1937. Is Duke stealing from Django or vice versa? Just curious.

Cameron

Tom Landman

Duke Ellington wrote many songs about trains and Django was obviously inspired by Ellington's "Daybreak Express."
You can listen to it here:
http://www.smithsonianjazz.org/audio_po ... xpress.ram

"Daybreak Express is one of Duke Ellington's most original compositions. It provides a vivid picture of a train speeding down the railroad tracks, with its sounds and bouncing rhythms heard and felt in the music. Duke Ellington loved trains, and he and his band spent long hours on them traveling all over the United States. As there was hardly a day he did not write down some musical idea, if only on a piece of scrap paper, he often composed while riding on trains. Daybreak Express is an example of program music, where music is used to describe a non-musical image or event. "