Rare small combo work from Duke Ellington – just the sort of excellent later-years material that follows nicely in the spirit of his Money Jungle and Live At The Whitney albums! As with those records, you'll hear an Ellington here who's a hell of a modernist – a wonderful talent in a piano trio setting, which gives him lots of space to open up and try out new ideas he might never have reached in some of his larger group dates. The material here is from two different sessions – one in 1966, with John Lamb on bass and Sam Woodyard on drums – the other from 1970, with Victor Gaskin and Paul Kondziela on bass, and Rufus Jones on drums. Titles include "Fat Mess", "Duck Amok", "The Shepherd", "Don Juan", "Looking Glass", and "Slow Blues". CD