The recently reopened National Portrait Gallery and Museum of American Art is an absolute treat. We spent a few hours there on Saturday, looking at the portraits of famous Americans, as well as the best of the portrait contest entries. More visits to come, with much more to say.
Saturday night we went to the Baird Auditorium to hear eight members of the Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra present a concert devoted to Billy Strayhorn music. Strayhorn wrote for the Ellington Band until his death at the age of 52, and although he stayed in the background, a significant number of the tunes and arrangements of Ellington's signature pieces were in fact by Strayhorn, or orchestrated by him.
Something to Live For, Multicolor Blue, Strange Feeling, Clementine, It Don't Mean a Thing if it Ain't Got That Swing, A Flower is a Lovesome Thing, Things Ain't What They Used to Be, Sitting and a-Rockin', All of a Sudden My Heart Sings, I'm Checking Out-Goombye, Satin Doll, Triple Play, What Else Can You Do with a Dream, UMMG, Tulip & Turnip, Daydreams, I Got it Bad and That Ain't Good, Take the A-Train.
Led by Loren Schoenberg, whose narration was informative and entertaining, with excellent vocals by Delores King Williams.
The audience was primarily white (strange for a jazz concert), and primarily old. Where is the younger generation? This was a program that anyone would have enjoyed.
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