The Mercer Ellington Orchestra

Blue Serge

In 1959 Mercer Ellington assembled his dad's working ensemble in a New York studio to record an album for Coral Records that is known as Colors in Rhythm. The idea was to take a few of Mercer's originals, along with some of Duke's tunes and a few standards and give them a new coat of paint. This arrangement of Mercer's tune Blue Serge was the only chart recorded during this session that was penned by Billy Strayhorn. This is a simple, but marvelous chart on the well-known Mercer Ellington composition. Strayhorn has flugelhorn (Clark Terry) and trumpet (Shorty Baker) state the melody for the first half of the tune. Following a trombone soli for the bridge, the baritone saxophone (Harry Carney) takes his/her turn with the melody. Throughout the entire chart there are wonderfully haunting backgrounds.

Ranges:
Trumpet 1: C6
Trombone 1: C#5
Trombone 2: Bb4