Duke Ellington & Johnny Hodges’ ‘Side By Side’ Gets Vinyl Reissue

Side By Side, one of two 1959 LPs that reunited former collaborators Duke Ellington and Johnny Hodges, will soon be in print again. Verve’s Acoustic Sounds Series is bringing the album back to vinyl this spring. Like all Acoustic Sounds Series titles, the Side By Side reissue is remastered from the analog tapes and pressed on 180-gram vinyl in deluxe gatefold packaging.

Due out April 18, Side By Side features the rekindled partnership between Ellington, one of the all-time great jazz pianists, and Hodges, the gifted alto saxophonist who spent decades playing in Ellington’s big band. It originally arrived on the heels of Back To Back: Duke Ellington And Johnny Hodges Play The Blues, the album that first presented Ellington and Hodges as peers and co-stars.

Side By Side brings together three songs from the 1959 session that yielded Back To Back along with six more from a 1958 session without Ellington. As such, the album was primarily a spotlight for the smooth and agile playing of Hodges, who’d spent the 1950s making a name for himself as a solo artist after stepping out of Ellington’s shadow. Notably, several players on the album are from outside Ellington’s usual stable of collaborators, including drummer Jo Jones, the only player besides Hodges to perform on all nine tracks.

The album forgoes Ellington’s familiar big band sound in favor of smaller ensembles. The tracks with Ellington also feature Harry “Sweets” Edison on trumpet, Les Spann on flute and guitar, Al Hall on bass, and Jones on drums. The remaining tracks sub in Billy Strayhorn on piano, with the rest of the lineup filled out by Roy Eldridge on trumpet, Lawrence Brown on trombone, Ben Webster on tenor saxophone, Wendell Marshall on bass, and Jones once again keeping the beat.

Order Duke Ellington & Johnny Hodges’ Side By Side on vinyl now.