Jazz Standards Songs and Instrumentals (Flamingo)

Vocalist Herb Jeffries introduced this standard with Duke Ellington’s orchestra. By mid-1941 it had taken off in the hit parade and rose to #11.

Jeffries tells the tale of how, one night in 1940 while performing with the Duke Ellington band at the Pearl Theater in Philadelphia, a stranger approached him. In a 1993 interview with Don Ferguson for the San Diego Union-Tribune, Jeffries recalled: "I was going out for dinner and this little guy stops me at the stage door. He says, in a French accent, ‘Monsieur Jeffries, I am Ted Grouya. The doorman would not let me in. Please, show my song to Monsieur Ellington.’ I said, `All right,’ and I put his music in my pocket. Later, I set it on my dressing-room table." Arranger/pianist Billy Strayhorn saw the music, took it over to the piano and began playing it. Ellington heard him and said, "Whatever you’re playing, make a chart of it." The music, with words added by Ellington chum Edmund Anderson, was "Flamingo." Duke, needing one additional number for the band’s December 28, 1940, recording session for RCA Victor, recorded the tune. Although RCA executive Leonard Joy wasn’t impressed with the recording, it was Ellington’s first number to hit the charts in 1941 and Jeffries’ second hit record.

After the recording was released, composer Grouya contacted Jeffries, upset that the singer had changed some of the words. Jeffries told him, "You’re lucky when you brought it to me, you couldn’t even get to Ellington. You’re lucky I’m not asking to include my name on it as co-composer." Once the tune was a hit, Grouya backed down. At Jeffries 88th birthday, Grouya was in attendance and performed the number with Jeffries.

"Flamingo" was on Duke Ellington’s short list of favorite recordings. In Walter van de Leur’s biography, Something to Live For:The Music of Billy Strayhorn , Ellington is quoted as saying, "[Flamingo" was] the renaissance of vocal orchestration. Before then, an orchestration for a singer was usually something pretty tepid, and it was just background--that’s about all. But now, this had real ornamentation, fittingly done, supporting the singer and also embellishing the entire performance of both the singer and the band."