Hopefully, you’re now standing in front of 420 Elm Street, Northwest, one of a series of homes Ellington’s parents rented along the U Street corridor steps away from the prestigious Howard University aka “The Mecca”. It is believed the Ellington family lived here around 1906, within the historic gates of D.C.’s LeDroit Park neighborhood. It was one of the city’s most-distinctive neighborhoods known for its John McGill-designed Victorian homes built in the 1870s. It was also known, for its very affluent and cultured, African American middle-class community where many of the black intelligentsia of this era resided such as Mary Church Terrell, Anna J. Cooper, Paul Laurence Dunbar and Langston Hughes, among many other trailblazers in early 1900s Washington, D.C.

Ellington was brought up in this cultured society, living in a middle-class household: his father made blueprints for the U.S. Navy and served as a White House butler for extra income, and his mother, who hailed from a respected Washington family, set a dignified tone for the family to follow.&nbsp;“Ellington’s parents lived by the ideal of Victorian gentility until they died,”&nbsp;noted James Lincoln Collier in&nbsp;Duke Ellington,&nbsp;“and they raised Duke to it….The view that he was special was cut into Duke’s consciousness when he was very young.

Duke Soundscape: "Jubilee Stomp" (Public Domain)

Duke Residence: 420 Elm Street

In 1918, this address 1955 Third Street, Northwest was the first home for Ellington and his childhood sweetheart and new bride, Edna Thompson Ellington, who was expecting their son and future bandleader, Mercer. On March 11, 1919, Mercer Kennedy Ellington, was born.

Around the same time, his first group, Duke’s Serenaders were playing nightly at area jazz hotspots, while, he supplemented his income by painting signs during the day. Often he managed to persuade club owners to let him paint the signs announcing the group’s engagement. Ellington's burgeoning career was so successful that he was able to buy a house and a car. His personal musical style was starting to stand apart from his competitors.

Duke Soundscape: "Black Beauty" (Public Domain)

Duke & Edna Residence: 1355 3rd Street

Built in 1910, Washington, D.C.’s historic Howard Theatre began as the center of black culture locally and nationally billed as the “Theater of the People.” It was the largest venue in the world built for African American audiences and entertainers when it opened on August 22, 1910 almost two decades before Harlem’s Apollo Theater.&nbsp;

The Howard experienced, a highly successful, twenty year run hosting road shows, vaudeville and musical productions from Shakespeare to Shuffle Along and top notch entertainers like Duke Ellington, Sydney Bechet, James Reese Europe and his 60-piece Clef Club band. In 1929, the theater closed its doors after the stock market crash and leased its space for church revivals.

It reopened its doors on September 29, 1931, which marked the triumphant return at the gala reopening of its own favorite son and hometown hero, Duke Ellington who packed the house for a week-long engagement.&nbsp;Ellington’s appearance helped to cement the theater’s reputation as a national entertainment hotspot, which launched the careers of the “Queen of Swing”, Ella Fitzgerald and D.C.’s other native son and Motown’s “Prince of Soul”, Marvin Gaye.

Armstrong High School student, Billy Eckstine caught every new show at the Howard during this time, where he later jumpstarted his singing career and eventually headlined at the theater in the late 1930s with his be-bop orchestra. Eckstine fondly remembered the “Dukedom” at the Howard, “He was the biggest inspiration we had, the epitome of what we wanted to be. He gave us some dignity. When the Duke came that was it – the Howard was our Broadway.”

Its struggles over the years, resulted-in the Howard decaying for decades, until September 2010 when groundbreaking for extensive restoration of the theater began. It’s grand reopening was held on April 10, 2012 and a gleaming 20-foot statue of the legendary musician was unveiled outside of the “new” Howard on Ellington Plaza.

Hipsters, if you’re faced directly at the theater’s front entrance look to your left and walk just a few steps to get a closer glimpse of the “Duke’s” spectacular, commemorative sculpture.

Image: <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/geoliv/50057557818">"The Howard Theatre with Black Lives Matter Signage"</a> by&nbsp;<a data-track="attributionNameClick" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/geoliv/" title="Go to Geoff Livingston's photostream">Geoff Livingston</a>&nbsp;is licensed under&nbsp;<a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0/">CC BY-NC-ND 2.0</a>

The Howard: Theater of the People

Before you right next door to the majestic Howard Theatre was where young Ellington would sneak in and listen to the early ragtime sounds of stride piano players and would eventually play there himself. At the tender age of 14, Ellington started sneaking into Frank Holiday's Poolroom now what rested on this site at 624 T Street was two separate row houses, 624 and 626 T Street, and they were used for about 30 or 40 years as rental residences for African Americans. Sometime between 1910 and 1913 the wall between the two buildings was knocked out on the first floor and they were combined into one business. It's at this point that this site became Frank Holiday's Pool Hall.

Hearing the poolroom pianists play their syncopated rhythms ignited Ellington's love for the instrument, and he began to take his piano studies more serious. Among the many stride piano players he observed and listened to were Oliver “Doc” Perry, Eubie Blake, Lester Dishman, Louis Brown, Gertie Wells, Sticky Mack, Blind Johnny, Claude Hopkins and Luckey Roberts.

Heavily influenced by the playing style of earlier jazz artist, "Doc" Perry, who taught Ellington how to read music; he began filling in for Perry and other musicians in clubs and cafes in this neighborhood. Ellington writes in his autobiography, Music Is My Mistress:

“Of course, all the piano players used to hang out there, too. There was Ralph Green, who never really became a professional piano player. Claude Hopkins was there. Shrimp Bronner was another. Phil Word, who used to play the piano at the Howard Theatre, was a good song writer too. Roscoe Lee, who became a dentist, would be there. He and Claude Hopkins were reader piano players, like Doc Perry, Louis Brown, and Louis Thomas, who came by from time to time. Les Dishman was the great left hand. Then there were Clarence Bowser, Sticky Mack, and Blind Johnny. These cats couldn't read, but there was a wonderful thing, an exchange, which went on between them and the guys who did.”

Duke Soundscape: "Diga Diga Doo" (Public domain)

Duke's Incubator: Frank Holliday's Poolroom

During much of the 1930s to 1950s, DC’s Seventh Street was a bustling hotbed of African American musical talent not confined to the glamour and refinement of U Street’s “Black Broadway,” producing many versatile musicians who performed jazz in clubs and social halls on Saturday nights, gospel in churches on Sunday mornings and classical or big band music at a variety of venues on Sunday afternoons.

The Little Harlem once located at 1837 7th Street, Northwest, marketed itself as a “modernistic cocktail lounge.” It was one of a dozen nightclubs in the neighborhood where Ellington and his orchestra mates played or hung out after hours with other musicians. Here’s the short list of Little Harlem’s alumni — DC native son/drummer, Jimmy Cobb, saxophonist Benny Golson, while a student at Howard University frequented the lounge and the Professor of Jazz/pianist, John Malachi. This important lost D.C. music shrine was a key cornerstone during the city’s zenith as a mecca of jazz.

Duke Soundscape: "I Can’t Give Anything But Love" (Public Domain)

Little Harlem: D.C.'s Modernistic Lounge

In the summer of 1914, young Ellington worked as a soda jerk at the Poodle Dog Café’s soda counter, which was once located in the 2000 block of Georgia Avenue, Northwest near the corner of 7th and Florida Avenue. One of the many clubs at that time across the country to borrow the name of the New Orleans original, it was also the place that inspired his first original composition, “Poodle Dog Rag,” later known as the “Soda Fountain Rag,” which he wrote by ear because at that time he didn't know how to read or write music. Pianist Claude Hopkins, another important early jazz figure from the Washington area, also played at the Poodle Dog Café.

&nbsp;"I would play the 'Soda Fountain Rag' as a one-step, two-step, waltz, tango, and fox trot", Ellington recalled. "Listeners never knew it was the same piece. I was established as having my own repertoire."&nbsp;

In his autobiography,&nbsp;Music is my Mistress&nbsp;(1973), Ellington wrote that he missed more lessons than he attended, feeling at the time that playing the piano was not his talent.

Duke Soundscape: "East Toodle Oo" (Public Domain)

The Poodle Dog Cafe

Though Ellington took piano lessons, he was more interested in&nbsp;baseball and as a young child, Duke was very fond of playing baseball. "President Teddy Roosevelt would come by on his horse sometimes, and stop and watch us play", he recalled in his memoirs.

In 1908, his very first job was selling peanuts at Washington Senators baseball games at D.C.’s Griffith Stadium once located here at the intersection of 7th Street and Florida Avenue, Northwest. The ballpark was demolished in 1965 and the&nbsp;Howard University Hospital&nbsp;now occupies this site.

Duke Soundscape: "Just A Settin’, And A Rockin’" (Public Domain)

Griffith Stadium

In November 1948, this site at 9th &amp; V Streets, Northwest marked the short-lived debut of the club named in honor of the “Duke”, fittingly, called “Duke Ellington’s Nightclub.” Legendary tenor saxophonist Ben Webster sat in one-week from November 1 through the 5th and November 7th through November 11th. The club's jazz line-up was followed by other popular bands featuring major jazz figures like Illinois Jacquet and Buddy Rich.

The club lasted only through the 1949 New Year's. Before, and hereafter, called the "Music Hall" until the 1950s when it became the site of WUST Radio Hall. The 1200 capacity performance space was associated with radio station WUST (1120 AM) once located at 1200 U Street, Northwest.&nbsp;Today, the radio station’s tower still rests on top of the venue, which is now the home of the 9:30 Club that “Rolling Stone” magazine named the best big performance room in America.

Duke Ellington's Nightclub

In its time, resting on this site was one of the neighborhood’s most vibrant nightspots -- Murray Casino. It was U Street’s most popular black dance hall in the 1920's that occupied the second floor over the Murray Brother’s printing company and featured plenty of music, including performances by Ellington’s 5-piece band; then known as the Washingtonians. His band included Sonny Greer on drums, his childhood friend Otto Hardwick on alto sax, Elmer Snowden on banjo and Arthur Whetsol on trumpet. They performed for both African-American and white audiences, which was quite rare in those times.

This building at 922 U Street, Northwest was designed by prominent black architect, Isaiah T. Hatton. In recent years, the building has been renovated and is used as offices by a local architecture firm.

Duke Soundscape: "Birmingham Breakdown" (Public Domain)

&nbsp;

Murray Casino

Located at the corner of 11th and U Streets, Northwest, the Bohemian Caverns built by African American businessman, John Whitelaw-Lewis opened as Club Caverns in 1926 in the basement of Davis Drug Store and operated as a speakeasy during the 20s Prohibition era when all other clubs closed at midnight. The Caverns was the place where entertainers and guests would gather late into the night through the early morning wee hours to dine on a simple menu of pork chops and chicken, and sip their spirits out of tea cups.

For decades the club at 2001 11th Street, Northwest alternatively known as the Crystal Caverns, or just The Caverns, (or affectionately, "The Cave"), was a high point along D.C.’s Black Broadway and a renowned venue on the ‘Chitlin circuit of African American entertainment districts. During its historic run, Pearl Bailey, Louis Armstrong, Cab Calloway, Ella Fitzgerald and Duke Ellington would come by the Caverns after their performances at neighboring jazz clubs and venues like the Howard Theatre to unwind and sometimes to perform at the venue’s jazz jam sessions that catered to Black Broadway’s elite. In the early 1960s, Miles Davis and John Coltrane played here. So, did D.C. native and jazz pianist/songstress, Shirley Horne. Today, it holds the distinction as one of the few clubs remaining from the 1920s to have survived, despite some periods of shutdown, and it still maintained its rich jazz tradition as one of the city’s coveted music venues of contemporary D.C. U Street before its recent closing in March, 2016.

Image: <a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bohemian_Caverns.jpg">"Bohemian Caverns"</a> by&nbsp;<a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Peterfitzgerald" title="User:Peterfitzgerald">Peter Fitzgerald</a>&nbsp;is licensed under&nbsp;<a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA 4.0</a>

Bohemian Caverns

In late 1917, Ellington formed his own group, “The Duke's Serenaders." The very first professional performance they gave was at this local and national African American civic landmark, True Reformer's Hall at 1200 U Street, Northwest from where the maestro earned 75 cents. Ellington’s band performed in the second-floor ballroom, Room #10.

Dedicated on July 15, 1903, this building has a very distinguished history. It was the first in the nation to be designed, financed, built, and owned by the African-American community after Reconstruction. John Anderson Lankford, the first African-American to be registered as an architect in Washington, D.C. was the designer and it was built by the Grand Fountain of the United Order of True Reformers. Fraternal and mutual benefit organizations, such as the True Reformers and the Knights of Pythias, who later owned the building, helped African-Americans set up small businesses, obtain insurance and meet other financial and social needs around the turn of the 20th century. It’s now the headquarters of the Public Welfare Foundation.

Image: <a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:True_reformer_building.jpg">"True reformer building"</a> by&nbsp;<a href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Aude" title="User:Aude">User:Aude</a>&nbsp;is licensed under&nbsp;<a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5/deed.en">CC BY-SA 2.5</a>

True Reformer Hall

Though it looks a bit nostalgic— as the city’s only remaining structure built as a nickelodeon theater, Ben’s Chili Bowl at 1213 U Street, Northwest didn’t open until August, 1958. Ben's rests on the site of Washington's first silent movie theatre, the Minnehaha, which was built in 1911. Founded by the husband and wife team, Ben and Virginia Ali in the heart of the U Street’s entertainment district just a few steps from the historic Lincoln Theatre.

The world-famous chili-dog eatery counts Ellington among its early music patrons who made sure he dropped by whenever his concert tours brought him back to his hometown. As you can see, today, Ben’s is still one of Washington’s most noted culinary and cultural landmarks that every visitor to the city should pay a visit.&nbsp;

Duke Soundscape: "Just a Settin’, And a 'Jivin" (Public Domain)

&nbsp;

Ben's Chili Bowl

This historic venue was the epicenter of D.C.’s thriving Black Broadway, it’s the Lincoln Theater at 1215 U Street, Northwest once known as the “Crown Jewel of U Street.” During the city’s Jim Crow era, the top Hollywood movies could only be viewed at white theaters, however, when the Lincoln opened its majestic doors in August, 1922, this was no longer so. It was the silent movies house and vaudeville site for African American patrons before turning into a luxury movie house in the late ’20s with a cabaret, a hot nightspot, and a social dance hall in the basement, the Lincoln Colonnade Ballroom.

By 1927, the Colonnade attracted jazz royalty, where visitors and even Presidential family’s like Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt traveled down a long tunnel to enjoy the musical stylings of Louis Armstrong, Count Basie and Ellington’s popular orchestra. Much like the Howard Theatre by the 1980s, the Lincoln fell on hard times and urban blight until its major restoration began in 1994. Today, the Lincoln remains as the cultural center of the new “U” Street corridor.

Duke Soundscape: "The Mooche" (Public Domain)&nbsp;

The Lincoln Theatre

In March 1919, Ellington and his young family rented a room at 1206 T Street, NW. The townhouse sold for more than $1 million in 2010. Now, let’s walk down to a few doors from here, where around 1919 or 1920, Duke's parents lived at 1212 T Street, Northwest and this was also his Washington address in 1923. One of the Ellington’s neighbors was Jesse H. Mitchell who would later become the founder of the black community’s financial institution, Industrial Bank at the corner of 11th and U Streets, Northwest in August,1934.

Hipsters, our final two destinations are located on the upper northwest side of town. They are very important civic and culture landmarks in our city that honor and celebrate our native son for generations to come.

Duke Soundscape: "Tiger Rag Pt. 1 &amp; 2" (Public Domain)

Ellington Residences: 1206 & 1212 T Street

Once upon a time, this noble façade at 1839 13th Street, Northwest belonged to the District’s first luxury hotel, the Whitelaw Hotel aka “The Embassy,” which opened in 1919. From its birth, the Whitelaw was a community effort, built and financed by black investors and entrepreneurs and designed by prominent black architect, Isaiah T. Hatton. &nbsp;

In the 1930s and 40s, Duke Ellington played at the high society functions hosted at this sophisticated hotel and was a frequent guest when he returned to his hometown to perform. Many residents of this Shaw community used to say it was named for the "white laws," which segregated Washington's hospitality industry. “The Embassy” was actually named for its builder, John Whitelaw Lewis, a black businessman who began construction of the hotel after World War I.

In its short heyday, the Whitelaw, also attracted the likes of the Hi De Ho Man, Cab Calloway and the Brown Bomber, Joe Louis and played host to debutante balls and many black tie occasions attended by Washington's black elite. Sadly, during the 1960s, it deteriorated into a drug den, and in 1977 District officials condemned the Whitelaw.

In 1991, it was restored to its original elegance and today it still serves as a symbol of community pride and houses subsidized, low-cost apartments. The building’s lobby retains a display of the Whitelaw's past heydays, decline, and its restoration, including documents showing that Ellington and other famous African Americans were its clients.

Duke Soundscape: "Hot and Bothered" (Public Domain)

The Whitelaw Hotel (The Embassy)

Beginning a seven-year stay on the street, this address, 1805 13th Street, Northwest was the Ellington family’s home from 1910 to 1914.&nbsp; Like all, of the places where the musician lived in the city, is a private residence, though there is a historical marker out front.

There are rumors that Ellington’s grandmother used to yell at him from the home’s window to stop playing outside and come in to practice the piano. Both of Duke’s parents were very accomplished pianists. Most middle-class black families of that era had a piano in their home; the Ellington’s had two.&nbsp;His mother, Daisy primarily played&nbsp;parlor songs&nbsp;and his father, James played the piano by ear and could sing excerpts from several operas and operettas.

From 1915 to 1917, the Ellington family lived just up the block at 1816 13th Street, Northwest. There was a little more room for the Ellington family and its where Duke started writing music.

Duke Soundscape: "Louisiana" (Public Domain)

Ellington Residences: 1805 & 1816 13th Streets

Duke is to Washington what Louis Armstrong is to New Orleans or what Charlie Parker is to Kansas City. The elegance and sophistication of Duke’s persona and musical genius was shaped and molded in Washington, DC, where the musician grew up influenced by the music of the early 20th century — ragtime, gospel and classical — before he began penning his own music compositions and forming his first dance bands while still in high school.&nbsp;In his early professional career years, he solidified his reputation as a solid composer and band leader along Washington, D.C.’s “lively” and “colorful” historic U Street entertainment district. It was a hot-bed for African American musical talent later known as “Black Broadway.” He performed in U Street’s stately theaters, after-hours nightclubs and its plentiful social halls on Saturday nights before moving to the Big Apple with his jazz orchestra in 1923.

In his fifty-year career, he gave American music its own sound for the first time through his famed recordings that influenced millions of people both at home and abroad, where he played over 20,000 performances in Europe, Latin America, the Middle East as well as Asia. Enjoy this mobile storytelling tour and self-directed journey, “Native Roots: The Duke’s Washington”, a rewarding African American experience and historical time capsule of early D.C. Ellingtonia for avid fans of American music and those that continue to celebrate his unparalleled talent, contributions and cultural legacy.

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Native Roots | The Duke's Washington

Washington DC

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Washington DC

Native Roots | The Duke's Washington

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