In 1932, the maverick Australian-born composer-pianist Percy Grainger was teaching a music course at New York University, and one day he said to his class, “The greatest composers who ever lived are Bach, Delius, and Duke Ellington. Unfortunately Bach is dead, Delius is very ill, but we are happy to have with us today the Duke.” And Ellington and his band came in to play.
Story told by Alex Ross in the first installment of a dialogue the classical music critic of The New Yorker is having with Ben Ratliff, the jazz critic of the Times — Alex Ross and Ben Ratliff discuss jazz, classical, and pop.