Sophisticated Lady

"Sophisticated Lady" is a jazz standard, composed as an instrumental in 1932 by Duke Ellington and Irving Mills, to which words were added by Mitchell Parish. The words met with approval from Ellington, who described them as "wonderful—but not entirely fitted to my original conception".

That original conception was inspired by three of Ellington's grade school teachers. "They taught all winter and toured Europe in the summer. To me that spelled sophistication".

Arild Andresen, piano with guitar and bass recorded it in Oslo on March 11, 1955 as the first melody of the medley "Klaver-Cocktail Nr. 3" and "With a Song in My Heart" and "Flamingo". The medley was released on the 78 rpm record His Master's Voice A.L. 3514.

The song has been covered in more contemporary times by the rock band Chicago, on their back-to-the-roots disc, Night & Day: Big Band.

Linda Ronstadt recorded the song with Nelson Riddle for the album "Lush Life" (1984).

In 1987, guitarist Larry Coryell covered the song from his album "Toku Do".^[1]

In 2005, another instrumentalist Marcus Miller covered the song from his album "Silver Rain".^[2][3]

See also

• List of 1930s jazz standards

References

External links

• "Sophisticated Lady" at jazzstandards.com
• Who Was Duke's Sophisticated Lady?