Ella Fitzgerald

Singer

• Born: April 25, 1917
• Birthplace: Newport News, Virginia
• Died: June 15, 1996
• Place of death: Beverly Hills, California

Singer

Fitzgerald fronted some of the greatest jazz acts of the twentieth century. Her Songbook series provided the definitive interpretations of the work of American songwriting legends such as Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, and George and Ira Gershwin. She was known for precision, diction, and improvisation.

Areas of achievement: Music: bandleading; Music: jazz; Music: swing

Early Life

Ella Jane Fitzgerald was born in Newport News, Virginia, on April 25, 1917. Her parents, William and Temperance (Tempie), separated when Fitzgerald was an infant. Fitzgerald later moved with her mother to Yonkers, New York, where they lived with Joe da Silva, Tempie’s common-law husband. Tempie and Joe had a daughter, Frances da Silva, in 1923.

When Fitzgerald was fifteen, her mother died in a car accident. Fitzgerald and her half sister moved in with their aunt; soon after, Joe da Silva died of a heart attack. To help make ends meet, Fitzgerald became involved with mobsters and gamblers, taking occasional work running bets for bookies. Eventually, this work landed her in the New York Colored Orphan Asylum in the Bronx, where she suffered humiliating beatings. Fitzgerald spent part of 1932 in the orphanage before running away. Homeless and struggling to find work, she entered a talent competition at the Apollo Theater in Harlem in 1934. Fitzgerald intended to dance but learned that she was to follow another talented dancing act; she made a last-minute decision to sing instead. She performed several songs by the Boswell Sisters, whom she greatly admired. Fitzgerald’s decision not to dance was a lucrative one, as it won her the twenty-five-dollar first prize, an exceptionally large sum for a seventeen-year-old in the Depression era.

Fitzgerald met the famous jazz drummer Chick Webb in 1935. Webb told the press that he and his wife Sallye had adopted the teenage singer, who performed with his orchestra in several Harlem venues, including the Savoy Ballroom. Fitzgerald began writing and recording songs, including her 1938 hit “A Tisket, a Tasket,” which she cowrote with songwriter Al Feldman. The song was a jukebox favorite and was number one on the popular radio program Your Hit Parade for nearly three months. Almost fifty years later, in 1986, the Grammy Hall of Fame honored Fitzgerald for the song.

Life’s Work

In June of 1939, Webb died of spinal surgery complications. Fitzgerald took on the role of bandleader, changing the group’s name to Ella Fitzgerald and Her Famous Band. After two years of continuous performing and touring, Fitzgerald left to pursue a solo career, singing with Dizzy Gillespie’s big band. It was during her time with Gillespie that Fitzgerald developed the “scat” style of singing that she helped popularize. Fitzgerald’s virtuoso scat performances, such as on “Oh Lady Be Good,” became legendary; other artists soon began copying the style. She later joined the Jazz at the Philharmonic tour, headlining with performers including Louis Armstrong, by whom she was greatly inspired.

In 1956, Verve Records signed Ella Fitzgerald to record Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Cole Porter Songbook, which became one of her most popular and significant albums. This work helped solidify her reputation in the music industry. She went on to record Songbook albums of the work of several songwriters, including Duke Ellington, Irving Berlin, and George and Ira Gershwin. Verve also recorded several Fitzgerald and Armstrong collaborations, starting with the 1956 album Ella and Louis. The album featured Oscar Peterson on piano and Fitzgerald’s ex-husband, bassist Ray Brown, whom she had married in December, 1947, and divorced in August, 1953.

During the 1940’s and 1950’s, black performers often received unequal treatment and were frequently forced to lodge at “Negro only” hotels after performances—if they could get booked at all. In the South, it was especially difficult to book venues, and the audience seating was typically segregated. Dressing rooms were of inferior quality to those given to white artists. In 1955, Fitzgerald was arrested, along with Gillespie and saxophonist Illinois Jacquet, while in Houston with the Jazz at the Philharmonic tour. The artists were in their dressing room playing cards and dice when the police came in unannounced and arrested them. They were later charged with drug possession, a charge that their activist manager Norman Granz fought and eventually defeated. Discrimination also prompted Fitzgerald to sue Pan Am Airways on December 23, 1954, after she, Granz, assistant Georgiana Henry, and pianist John Lewis were forced off a plane to accommodate white passengers. Fitzgerald and her group were delayed for three days, disrupting their tour. The group lost the lawsuit, but the event drew attention to racial prejudice within the transportation industry.

Although racism abounded during Fitzgerald’s career, her music gained her the support of several influential people, including Frank Sinatra and Marilyn Monroe. A great admirer of Fitzgerald in the 1950’s, Monroe contacted the owners of the Mocambo, a popular Hollywood nightclub, and encouraged them to book Fitzgerald as their first black performer in the spring of 1955. The club agreed, and Monroe attended every night, sitting in the front row for each performance. Monroe’s support helped to elevate Fitzgerald’s career and break down the color barrier for other artists. After the Mocambo performance, Fitzgerald went on to perform on television, appearing on programs such as The Ed Sullivan Show. Fitzgerald also had several little-known film roles, including a cameo in the 1942 Bud Abbott and Lou Costello film Ride ’em Cowboy, in which she sang “A Tisket, a Tasket” onboard a bus, then took her seat at the back.

Fitzgerald’s health declined as she grew older. She suffered from diabetes, a disease that eventually left her blind and cost her the use of her legs, which were amputated in 1994. The disease was the cause of her death on June 16, 1996. Fitzgerald left behind an adopted son, Ray Brown, Jr., and a granddaughter, Alice. During her lifetime, Fitzgerald won numerous awards, including fourteen Grammy Awards, one for lifetime achievement. She was named an Officer of the Order of Arts and Letters in France and received the National Medal of the Arts in 1987, as well as received honorary doctor of music degrees from many universities, among them Howard (1988) and Princeton (1990). Fitzgerald received the Peabody Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music in America (1983) and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People’s Image Award for Outstanding Achievement (1988). She was honored with the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1992. In 2007, the U.S. Postal Service released a commemorative stamp featuring Fitzgerald’s image.

Significance

Fitzgerald’s contribution to music is vast. Her work defines a generation of jazz and bebop music, and the legacy of her recordings—especially the Songbook series—greatly influenced musicians of her own generation as well as many who followed her. Her music enriched and inspired people all over the world; she performed sold-out international concerts that resulted in some of her greatest recordings, including Ella in Berlin: Mack the Knife (1960) and Ella in Rome: The Birthday Concert (1988). Fitzgerald worked with numerous jazz legends and received countless accolades throughout a career that spanned seven decades of American and African American history, from the Harlem Renaissance to the Montgomery bus boycotts, from affirmative action to the Rodney King riots. Her musical talent raised the profile of black musicians and helped draw attention to the treatment of African Americans in general. Her inimitable style and love of the audience earned her a place in the cultural history of America, and her success in the face of adversity continues to inspire.

Bibliography

Estate of Ella Fitzgerald. http://www.ellafitzgerald.com/. This Web site provides a wealth of information regarding Fitzgerald’s life and music. Contains a discography and information about Fitzgerald’s charity.

Gourse, Leslie, ed. The Ella Fitzgerald Companion: Seven Decades of Commentary. New York: Shirmer Books, 1998. A compendium of reviews, commentary, and criticism that follows Fitzgerald’s career from her first big hit (“A Tisket, a Tasket”) to her later recordings and last live performance at Carnegie Hall in 1991.

Nicholson, Stuart. Ella Fitzgerald: A Biography of the First Lady of Jazz. Updated ed. New York: Routledge, 2004. Comprehensive biography and a sound resource for understanding the complexities of Fitzgerald’s range and style.

Stone, Tanya Lee. Up Close: Ella Fitzgerald. New York: Viking, 2008. Aimed at younger readers, this basic biography provides all the essential details of Fitzgerald’s life.

Vail, Ken. Ella Fitzgerald: The Chick Webb Years and Beyond. Lanham, Md.: Scarecrow Press, 2003. Provides biographical information on Fitzgerald’s private life, including her marriage to Brown, her work with Webb, and her years serving as bandleader after Webb’s death.

Wyman, Carolyn. Ella Fitzgerald: Jazz Singer Supreme. New York: Franklin Watts, 1998. This book for young readers highlights the racial prejudice experienced by Fitzgerald and other artists of the jazz era.