Word: duke
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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What else could be expected when the President throws a party in the White House for one of the greatest figures of American jazz, Edward Kennedy ("Duke") Ellington? Presenting Ellington with the Medal of Freedom on his 70th birthday-the first such award in the new Administration-Nixon said: "In the royalty of American music, no man swings more or stands higher than the Duke." The Duke responded by bussing the startled President twice on each cheek...
Agnew's Style. It was not Ellington's first contact with the White House. His father was a part-time butler in Harding's day, and in the past the Duke himself has been honored with membership on the National Arts Council. But it was by far his most pleasant experience with a President. Besides Nixon's Happy Birthday, played on the eagle-legged piano of the East Room stage, Vice President Spiro T. Agnew sat down to play two of Ellington's own compositions, Sophisticated Lady and In a Sentimental Mood, in a surprisingly...
...piano-playing President since Harry Truman, enthusiastically endorsed it. Ellington did not participate in anyone's campaign and, in fact, had not even met Nixon until the day of the party. The traditional political types were not invited, and the guest list was limited almost entirely to the Duke's old friends. Most of them are musicians who could not carry a precinct...
...free and for fun. Mary Mayo and Joe Williams sang, and when Nixon and Agnew were not using it, the piano was rotated among Hank Jones, Dave Brubeck and Fatha Hines, who nearly sent its legs flying with a ripping rendition of Perdido. Best of all, perhaps, was the Duke's own improvisation of "something soft and gentle" on the name of Pat. Mrs. Nixon was enchanted...
...accused Cornell of "selling out to terrorists." At least a dozen pledged to suspend teaching until the campus was free of guns, a demand that Perkins seemed unable to satisfy. Three scholars resigned, including Allan P. Sindler, chairman of the government department and a onetime civil-rights leader at Duke, who charged his colleagues with a lack of "integrity, guts, common sense and dignity." In contrast, English Professor M. H. Abrams supported the reverse vote as the only rational course. "To stand on legality, to temporize, would be disastrous," he said. "The only thing to do is wipe the slate...