Ella Sings Broadway

Infobox Album | Name = Ella Sings Broadway
Type = Album
Artist = Ella Fitzgerald

| Released = 1963
Recorded = October 1- October 4 1962
Genre = Jazz
Length = 34:08
Label = Verve Records
Producer = Norman Granz
Reviews =
* Allmusic Rating|3|5 [http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:r9s9keftjq7z link] | Last album = "Ella Swings Gently with Nelson"
(1962)
This album = " Ella Sings Broadway "
(1963)
Next album = "Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Jerome Kern Songbook "
(1963) |

"Ella Sings Broadway" is a 1963 (see 1963 in music) studio album by the American jazz singer Ella Fitzgerald, with an orchestra arranged and conducted by the American bandleader Marty Paich [http://ellafitzgerald.altervista.org/discog_03.htm] . Ella had previously recorded with Paich and his more familiar Dek-tette on the 1957 album "Ella Swings Lightly", and was to record with him again on her 1967 album "Whisper Not". Shortly before the sessions for " Ella Sings Broadway ", Ella had recorded two singles with Marty Paich, the Antonio Carlos Jobim song 'Desafinado' and a Bossa Nova version of the jazz standard 'Stardust'.

This album is a fascinating musical departure for Ella in many senses. As the author David Hajdu comments in his liner notes for the 2001 reissue of " Ella Sings Broadway ", virtually every important singer of standards had recorded an album of musical-theatre songs, Sinatra with "My Kind of Broadway" and "The Concert Sinatra" (an album often mistaken for a live recording), Sarah Vaughan with " Great Songs From Hit Shows " and Doris Day with " Show Time ".

These singers, especially Sinatra and Fitzgerald, had acquired a reputation of being consummate performers of the Great American Songbook, a songbook which by and large had been written before the outbreak of the Second World War, and which had been aped in its popularity with youth by Rock and Roll the time of the Vietnam War. With many Gershwin, Porter and Berlin standards having been written in the 1920s and 1930s, whilst Sinatra and Fitzgerald were growing up.

On " Ella Sings Broadway ", Ella connects with the Broadway songs of the previous decade and a half, vastly different in musical terms to the Great American Songbook standards from 40 years previously.

The twelve songs are from eight musicals, being;

* " Warm All Over " and "Somebody Somewhere" from Frank Loesser's " Most Happy Fella " (1956)
* " If I Were a Bell " and " Guys and Dolls " from Frank Loesser's " Guys and Dolls " (1950)
* " Almost Like Being in Love " from Lerner and Lowe's " Brigadoon " (1947)
* " I Could Have Danced All Night " and "Show Me" from Lerner and Lowe's " My Fair Lady " (1956)
* " No Other Love" from Rodgers and Hammerstein's " Me and Juliet " (1953)
* " Dites-Moi" from Rodgers and Hammerstein's " South Pacific " (1949)
* " Hernando's Hideaway " and "Steam Heat" from Adler and Ross's " Pajama Game " (1954)
* " Whatever Lola Wants " from Adler and Ross's " Damn Yankees " (1955)

Awarded 4 stars by Down Beat jazz magazine in 1963, the review commented that it was "A perfect complement to Fitzgerald's classic series of 'Song Book' albums".

Track listing

* Original Lp issue - " Ella Sings Broadway " Verve V6-4059
* 2001 Cd re-issue - " Ella Sings Broadway " Verve 549 373-2

#"Hernando's Hideaway" (Richard Adler, Jerry Ross) – 3:17
#"If I Were a Bell" (Frank Loesser) – 2:22
#"Warm All Over" (Loesser) – 2:46
#"Almost Like Being in Love" (Alan Jay Lerner, Frederick Loewe) – 3:02
#"Dites-Moi" (Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein II) – 2:30
#"I Could Have Danced All Night" (Lerner, Loewe) – 2:22
#"Show Me" (Lerner, Loewe) – 2:22
#"No Other Love" (Rodgers, Hammerstein) – 2:20
#"Steam Heat" (Adler, Ross) – 3:27
#"Whatever Lola Wants" (Adler, Ross) – 3:13
#"Guys and Dolls" (Loesser) – 2:21
#"Somebody Somewhere" (Loesser) – 3:12

Personnel

Recorded October 1-4, 1962 at Capitol Studios, Hollywood, Los Angeles:

* Val Valentin - Engineer

Tracks 1-12

* Ella Fitzgerald - vocals
* Marty Paich - arranger, conductor

Others Unknown.

References