This webpage is an "evergreen" project intended for Ellington researchers to share information. New information, references and corrections are welcome.

Duke Ellington, born in 1899, began his musical career in his home town, Washington, D.C. In 1923 he and his musician friends took their music to New York where they played in various clubs and theatres and began recording as early as 1923. In late 1927 they became the house band at the Cotton Club, and Ellington's career took off. He and his sidemen, many of them stars in their own right, travelled the world with their music right up until a couple of months before Ellington died in 1974.

Whenever I refer to the late Dr. Klaus Stratemann of Germany's comprehensive Duke Ellington: Day by Day and Film by Film. I am over-awed by the picture it paints of Duke Ellington's travels during the ordinary course of his working life throughout his career.

There is an incredible amount of information about Ellington's working life and travels in over three decades of tri-annual DEMS Bulletins, in Stratemann, and in THE definitive Ellington discography, The New Desor, by Luciano Massagli and Giovanni M. Volonté.

Researcher and record collector Klaus Götting of Paris, France, compiled a directory of Ellington's itinerary from March, 1923 through to the end of his life, titled The Duke – Where and When. Initially for his own use, this document includes direct and indirect contributions from fellow researchers from around the world and from other sources. TDWAW will help you find out what Ellington was doing and where he was on a particular date and guide you to more detailed information in the DEMS Bulletins, Stratemann or New Desor.

M. Götting made TDWAW available on request to members of the Ellington community at least as long ago as 2009. At researcher Herr Carl Hällström's suggestion, M. Götting agreed to let it be used as the basis of this webpage, to serve as a resource for the research community. Entries in this colour are from the August 2011 version of TDWAW, and entries from all other sources are in black.

Individuals who contributed information directly or indirectly to TDWAW include Ken Steiner (USA), Carl A. Hällström (Sweden), the late Sjef Hoefsmit (Belgium), Agustín Pérez Gasco (Spain), Arne Neegaard (Norway), Steven Lasker (USA), Jan Bruér (Sweden), Ken Vail, the late Dr. Klaus Stratemann (Germany), William E. Timner (Canada), Michael Graff (USA), the late Jerry Valburn (USA), Roger Boyes (UK), and of course, all the contributors to DEMS. If you contributed information but your name is not shown, please accept my apology and let me know so I can credit you.

Since this is not a discography, where I've chosen to show what was recorded in a session, I've only listed the titles, without repeating a title if there's more than one take.

Much of itinerary began with research done by individuals such as the late Joe Igo, the late Gordon Ewing and the late Art Pilkington (see DEMS 08/2-6) and a great deal of credit is due to the late Sjef Hoefsmit and the late Benny H. Aasland of The International Duke Ellington Society for their work over the years in gathering and sharing this body of knowledge.

Many events are described quite briefly, but the references should allow you to look them up. While this webpage is based on M. Götting's TDWAW, as a webpage it has the room to add more information, and will include more information about important events in the lives of Ellington and his sidemen, gathered from many sources. An item marked as an update may simply be an added reference or a rewording, or it may include additional information.

Personnel changes are noted, taken from the second volume of New Desor. Exact dates are not usually shown, and where people left and returned, I have not checked to see if their departures were planned to be only a break or if they intended to leave forever. Similarly, some members were in the band only a for short time, and I don't know if they were hired for a short length of time or were intended to be permanent members of the band.

Caution

Since Ellington often changed his plans, a review after an event is more reliable than an advertisement beforehand. Where an event is only supported by advance publicity (previews) or by advertisements, you should consider it to unconfirmed, although an ad on the day of the event is more likely to be reliable than one a week or two ahead of time.