Cottontail - Duke Ellington

[jazzhound]

Can anybody come up with a better way to end this? I want the last chord to come on the "and" of 2, to match the melody—I know that's not currently possible in IRP—the closest I can fudge it is by converting the last measure to two measures of 2/4. It's close enough for practice, but is there a more elegant way of doing it?

Cottontail - Duke Ellington

 

[pdxdjazz]

Closer?
Cottontail 3 - Duke Ellington

)BOB

 

[engelbach]

What to choose: a half beat too late or a half beat too soon?

If the last chord is too early its continuing reverb and the cymbal do cover the last melody note.

On the other hand, Ellington played it with an additional beat after the last note, as was often the custom back then. Using Bob's version but putting the last measure in 3/4 (one of a couple of ways to achieve an extra beat) is closer to Duke's:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbOseBw-fnU

Ben Webster, however, ended it cold:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ARfoLSWfV0I

Decisions, decisions.

Oh, how I love YouTube!

Cheers,
Jer