# The 28 Best Duke Ellington Albums

> Concert-hall suites share the stage with smoky small-group sessions, and the famous 1950s comeback faces off against late-career experiments few casual fans have heard.

*By YPB Team · Published October 31, 2026 · https://youpick.best/ranking/the-28-best-duke-ellington-albums*

---

## Current results (no votes yet)

1. **Ellington at Newport** — score 1000/1000
   The 1956 live album whose Paul Gonsalves-fuelled Newport set revived Ellington's career overnight.
2. **Ellington Uptown** — score 862/1000
   A 1953 Columbia LP featuring the extended Harlem suite and Louie Bellson's drum showcase Skin Deep.
3. **Such Sweet Thunder** — score 812/1000
   Ellington and Billy Strayhorn's 1957 suite of musical portraits inspired by Shakespeare.
4. **The Nutcracker Suite** — score 755/1000
   Ellington and Strayhorn's swinging 1960 reworking of Tchaikovsky's ballet music.
5. **Afro-Bossa** — score 689/1000
   A 1963 Reprise album blending Latin, African and Middle Eastern colours into short orchestral pieces.
6. **Duke Ellington Meets Coleman Hawkins** — score 611/1000
   A warm 1962 Impulse! small-group date pairing Ellington's men with the tenor saxophone pioneer.
7. **First Time! The Count Meets the Duke** — score 611/1000
   The 1961 summit where the Ellington and Count Basie orchestras play side by side.
8. **Back to Back** — score 517/1000
   A 1959 blues session co-led with alto saxophonist Johnny Hodges.
9. **The Latin American Suite** — score 517/1000
   A sunny 1972 suite written after the orchestra's tour of South America and Mexico.
10. **New Orleans Suite** — score 517/1000
   A Grammy-winning 1971 suite saluting the birthplace of jazz and its great musicians.
11. **Jazz Party** — score 517/1000
   A playful 1959 stereo showcase with guest Dizzy Gillespie and a battery of nine percussionists.
12. **Anatomy of a Murder** — score 517/1000
   The 1959 soundtrack to Otto Preminger's courtroom drama, a milestone for jazz in Hollywood film scoring.
13. **The Popular Duke Ellington** — score 517/1000
   A 1966 RCA album of fresh orchestral takes on his best-known hits, from Take the A Train to Solitude.
14. **The Afro-Eurasian Eclipse** — score 402/1000
   A late-period 1971 suite exploring how world cultures were influencing one another, released posthumously in 1975.
15. **The Duke Plays Ellington** — score 402/1000
   A 1953 Capitol trio album, later reissued as Piano Reflections, of Ellington interpreting his own songs.
16. **A Drum Is a Woman** — score 402/1000
   Ellington's 1957 jazz fantasy narrating the history of the music through the character Madam Zajj.
17. **Black, Brown and Beige** — score 402/1000
   Ellington's 1958 studio recasting of his landmark suite, with Mahalia Jackson singing Come Sunday.
18. **Blues in Orbit** — score 402/1000
   A loose, late-night 1960 session of blues-based pieces recorded with the orchestra in relaxed form.
19. **Piano in the Foreground** — score 402/1000
   A 1961 trio record that puts Ellington's adventurous piano playing front and centre.
20. **Indigos** — score 402/1000
   A 1958 album of slow, moody ballads built around the orchestra's lush soloists.
21. **Never No Lament** — score 402/1000
   The essential collection of the 1940-42 Blanton-Webster band, often called Ellington's greatest orchestra.
22. **Money Jungle** — score 0/1000
   A combative 1963 trio date with Charles Mingus and Max Roach that shows Ellington's piano at its most modern.
23. **...And His Mother Called Him Bill** — score 0/1000
   Ellington's 1967 tribute to Billy Strayhorn, recorded months after his longtime collaborator's death.
24. **Duke Ellington & John Coltrane** — score 0/1000
   The 1963 Impulse! meeting with John Coltrane, home to a celebrated reading of In a Sentimental Mood.
25. **The Far East Suite** — score 0/1000
   A 1967 suite inspired by the orchestra's State Department tour of Asia, featuring Johnny Hodges on Isfahan.
26. **Masterpieces by Ellington** — score 0/1000
   A 1951 LP that used the new long-playing format to stretch classics like Mood Indigo into full concert arrangements.
27. **Concert of Sacred Music** — score 0/1000
   The 1966 recording of Ellington's first Sacred Concert, the start of the work he called his most important.
28. **Ellington at Fargo, 1940 Live** — score 0/1000
   An amateur recording of a 1940 dance in North Dakota that captured the Blanton-Webster band live.

Tags: music, jazz, duke ellington, big band