Customer Reviews

Bluella: Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Blues

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

You just can't go wrong with Ella; all her stuff is good. In this album, she gets bluesy-- but not blue. This album is an "up" album, like the rest of her work. But here she lets loose and does a lot of scat and vocalization. It is a good change of pace from her usual jazz standard mode.

Here is 63:33 of the best Blues ever recorded by the great Ella Fitzgerald!11 tunes recorded both live in concert & studio
settings capture this great songbird in a variety of 'deep blue' offerings. If you like 'hippity,bippity bop' stuff along with 'low
down gritty' stuff alongside some really 'smacking & jiving boogie' Blues in the 12 bar style you got 'em all here! "Happy Blues"
taken from the '74 live Ella In London (Pablo), "Fine And Mellow" taken from the '74 studio release Fine And Mellow
(Pablo) & the live version taken from the '79 Ella And Basie: A Perfect Match (Pablo) are enough to wallop you right solid
in the heart! On the live versions Ella cries the Blues something stinging! If you don't have the Blues now...You may after
hearing this CD! By the way "C-Jam" at 10:41 taken from the '72 Jazz At The Philharmonic:Jazz At The Santa Monica
Civic (Pablo) kills! This compilation features such Jazz greats as Count Basie, Joe Pass, Louis Bellson, Stan Getz & Herb Ellis
among others alongside Ella. Along with the superb liner notes & the great sonics thanks to all the material being digitally
remastered you cannot go wrong with this CD

Ella's recordings amount to a virtual encyclopedia of American song. In "Bluella" she's at her 1970s earthy and humorous best. Singing with some of Jazz's hardest swingers, she makes the blues her own and shows her place as second to none in the presence of an astonishing array of male jazz talent, most of whom are all-star all stars. Here you have Ella and her remarkably happy blues, which the live audience understandably cannot resist. I promise you won't be able to concentrate on anything else while you listen to this music.