Duke Ellington Movies

The Duke Ellington Orchestra performs 'C Jam Blues'.

The Cold War and Civil Rights collide in this remarkable story of music, diplomacy and race. Beginning in 1955, when America asked its greatest jazz...

Joined by the likes of saxophonist Ben Webster and trumpeter Cootie Williams, jazz giant Duke Ellington demonstrates in this collection of...

This short documentary by writer and archivist Ehsan Khoshbakht tells the story of Duke Ellington's concert tour of the Middle East in 1963 and the...

A journey into the BBC archives unearthing glorious performances and candid interviews from the golden age of jazz. Featuring some of the greatest...

Ossie Davis narrates a history of "race films," films made before 1950 which catered to a primarily black audience.

The classic songs of legendary jazz composer Duke Ellington come alive on stage in this performance video. Duke Ellington's Sophisticated Ladies...

Jeff grows up near Basin Street in New Orleans, playing his clarinet with the dock workers. He puts together a band, the Basin Street Hot-Shots,...

Duke Ellington and his orchestra play two jazz compositions plus 'Stormy Weather' (sung by Ivy Anderson).

Agent Pete Garland is fired by society singer Monica Barrett after he got her a new radio contract, because she thinks her lawyer friend Teddy Leeds...

Gracie Allen assumes the "management" of the shop owned by her papa Horatio Allen, turning it into a radio station and then an aviary---with the...

1942 Short restored in true form

Restored film directed by Will Cowan in 1943

The rather dusty black-and-white footage, dating from the summer of 1966, opens with bikinis, beach umbrellas and Foster Grant-shaded sophisticates...

A compilation reel of television commercials produced by Story Board Inc.

A white man's brain is transplanted into a black man's skull.

Short directed by Will Cowan as tribute to Duke Ellington

Duke Ellington plays hot jazz in a fictional story that finds him down on his luck; he tries in vain to dissuade his friend, dancer Fredi Washington,...

A made-for-TV musical revue, compiled from soundies and film and TV performances by jazz greats from the 1930s to the 1950s.

In 1999, on the occasion of the centenary of Ellington's birth, Franco Maresco commissioned Steve Lacy to perform ten songs by the Duke, which were...