Take the "A" Train recorded an intentionally inept interpretation of the song under the pseudonym Darlene Edwards. In 1999, National Public Radio included this song in the "NPR 100", in which NPR's music editors sought to compile the one hundred most important American musical works of the 20th century. Take the "A" Train "Take the 'A' Train" is a jazz standard by Billy Strayhorn that was the signature tune of the Duke Ellington orchestra. The use of the Strayhorn composition as the signature tune was made necessary by a ruling in 1940 by the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP). When ASCAP
Ellington at Newport big bands folded by the mid-1950s, but Ellington kept his band working, occasionally doing shows in ice-skating rinks to stay busy. The Duke Ellington Orchestra did European tours during the early 1950s, and Ellington was chiefly supporting the band himself through royalties earned on his popular compositions of the 1920s to 1940s. At the time of the festival, the band did not even have a record deal. Duke and his orchestra arrived to play at the Newport Jazz Festival at a time when jazz festivals were a fairly new innovation. Ellington's band was the first and last group to play