Ella Fitzgerald

Ella Fitzgerald 1917-96, American jazz singer, b. Newport News, Va. Probably the most celebrated jazz vocalist of her generation, Fitzgerald was reared in Yonkers, N.Y., moving after her mother's death (1932) to Harlem, where two years later she won an amateur contest at the Apollo Theater. Thereafter she performed with Chick Webb's band. After he died in 1939 she managed the band herself until 1942, when she began to make solo appearances in supper clubs and theaters. Principally a jazz and blues singer of remarkably sweet and effortless style, Fitzgerald was noted for her sophisticated interpretation of songs by George Gershwin and Cole Porter and for her scat singing, an extremely inventive form of vocal jazz improvisation.

Fitzgerald, whose superb voice, wide repertoire, and accessible singing style appealed to both jazz and pop audiences, scored her first recording hit with "A-Tisket A-Tasket" (1938) and went on to become a perennially popular artist with such performances as the million-selling "I'm Making Believe" (1944, with the Ink Spots), the historic scat "Flying Home" (1945), the be-bop "Lady Be Good" (1947), and many hundreds more. She also wrote a number of songs and made numerous concert tours of the United States, Europe, and Asia. She appeared in several films, including Pete Kelly's Blues (1955) and St. Louis Blues (1958). Despite ill health, Fitzgerald continued performing into the early 1990s.

Bibliography: See biography by S. Nicholson (1994); C. Zwerin, dir., Ella Fitzgerald: Something to Live For (documentary film, 1999).

Fitzgerald, Ella (1917–1996), jazz and popular music singer.Born in Newport News, Virginia, Ella Fitzgerald grew up in Yonkers, New York. Escaping an abusive household, she ran away to Harlem at the age of fifteen. Originally a dancer, she debuted as a singer at Harlem's Apollo Theater in 1934, winning over a tough Amateur Night crowd. In 1935 she joined the Chick Webb band, known for its up‐tempo solos and the danceability of its music. To the dismay of jazz critics, who felt that she was wasting her talent, she first won fame with a series of novelty hits in the late 1930s and early 1940s. The first of these, A‐Tisket, A‐Tasket, recorded in 1938, diverted audiences from the Great Depression. She became the Webb band's leader from his death in 1939 until 1942.

In the early 1940s, Fitzgerald began performing modern jazz. By singing syllables and isolated words in a stream‐of‐consciousness fashion, or “scatting,” Fitzgerald offered a vocal analogue to modern jazz's rapid tempos and abrupt key changes, in the process becoming an important modern jazz artist. Later, she broadened her appeal by recording “songbook” albums featuring the music of Ira and George Gershwin, Harold Arlen, and Irving Berlin. By 1960, in a time when the record industry was targeting the youth market, she had sold millions of records to the audience that remembered her from the Swing Era. Worsening eyesight brought on by diabetes hampered Fitzgerald's career, though she continued to perform into her seventies.
See also Music: Popular Music.

Bibliography

Stuart Nicholson , Ella Fitzgerald, 1993.

Jonathan Z.S. Pollack