Thanks to all of the fabulous folks we saw at the 17th annual Jazz Education Network Conference in New Orleans recently! It was a great success, as the "jazz hang" of the year always is. Next year's will be Jan. 6 – 9 in Louisville, KY at the Galt House Hotel Trademark Collection by Wyndham. As we always do, we very strongly encourage coming, especially if you have never been. There's nothing else like it in the jazz world.

JANUARY NOTES: (Jan. 23rd Update) We have a really special new one to present. Ervin Drake wrote It Was a Very Good Year in 1961 for Bob Shane of The Kingston Trio, who wanted to record a vocal solo feature for the group's upcoming album Goin' Places. Sinatra supposedly heard the recording on the radio while driving back to his Palms Springs house and pulled over to the side of the road and called Gordon Jenkins and told him he wanted to record it. The subsequent 1965 recording for his album September of My Years, backed by a Jenkins arrangement, would become one of the cornerstone entries in Sinatra's catalog. This recording would net him a #1 adult contemporary hit and a Grammy award for Best Male Vocal Performance the following year. Jenkins also won a Grammy for his arrangement.

The combination of Ella Fitzgerald's voice, Quincy Jones's writing, and the orchestra of Count Basie makes for one of the most incomparably exciting and joyful sounds in jazz. Few citations prove this theory better than their recording of On the Sunny Side of the Street, recorded in 1963 for the album Ella and Basie! This arrangement was prepared from the set of parts used for the 1963 recording session - this is not a transcription. We also have Alexander's Ragtime Band, written by Irving Berlin, one of the earliest popular songs to become a jazz standard. Paul Weston's arrangement for Ella's Irving Berlin Songbook album (1958) is a highly creative re-imagining of the tune, swapping back and forth between two different styles to both pay tribute to the song's roots as well as give it a stylish update. It can also serve as a good mid-set break for your band's lead brass players, who leave most of the heavy lifting to the rest of their sections. This publication was prepared from Weston's original pencil score - this is not a transcription.

We now have listed most of the rest of the 2026 Essentially Ellington arrangements from Jazz at Lincoln Center. Included are the version of Diminuendo and Crescendo that made jazz history at the Newport Jazz Festival with the band playing a 19-year-old piece of Ellington's. The band was so hot and swinging that the audience caught the spirit and achieved the same kind of frenzy that bands experienced during the height of the swing era. We also have two from Melba Liston, The Gypsy as written for Quincy Jones and his Orchestra, and Late Date as written for the Art Blakey Big Band. There is also Billy Strayhorn's arrangement of Flamingo, as well as Dance #1 from the Liberian Suite and Portrait of Wellman Braud from the New Orleans Suite. 

Brand new is John Fedchock's wild take on Embraceable You; Fedchock takes this Gershwin standard and turns it on its head. Set in a medium waltz tempo, this chart features dense harmonies and inventive rhythmic play with the melody. Features solos for trumpet and piano. A must-have for advanced bands. Recorded by the John Fedchock New York Big Band on Up & Running (Reservoir RSR-188). 

We also have just released Tony Bennett's On the Sunny Side of the Street as written by Marion Evans. The eternal optimism of Bennett’s buttery tenor is a natural fit for the upbeat lyrics and melody of this classic, recorded on the 1967 album Tony Makes It Happen. Evans's arrangement takes on an appropriately bright and brassy attack.

Please click here to view December New Release Pages, which feaured Ella Fitzgerald's My Kinda Love as arranged by Marty Paich, and our first from our friend Steve Torok, his funky version of Pomp & Circumstance, March No. 1 (Trio Section) by Sir Edward Elgar.

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We now have almost 2500 PDF downloadable arrangements from Hal Leonard, Alfred Publishing, Kendor Music, and Doug Beach Music available to you!

Please click here for all Hal Leonard PDF downloadable arrangements.

Please click here for all Alfred Publishing PDF downloadable arrangements.

Please click here for all Kendor Music and Doug Beach Music PDF downloadable arrangements.