Search - Ella Fitzgerald, Count Basie :: Ella & Basie

Ella & Basie
Ella Fitzgerald, Count Basie
Ella & Basie
Genres: Blues, Jazz, Pop, Broadway & Vocalists
 
  •  Track Listings (18) - Disc #1

This 1963 session is a fine meeting of two great performers with a single-minded devotion to swing, a high point for both in the decade. The tunes are all familiar standards, many with roots in jazz, while the arrangements...  more »

     
?

Larger Image

CD Details

All Artists: Ella Fitzgerald, Count Basie
Title: Ella & Basie
Members Wishing: 0
Total Copies: 0
Label: Polygram Records
Release Date: 10/28/1997
Album Type: Original recording remastered
Genres: Blues, Jazz, Pop, Broadway & Vocalists
Styles: Swing Jazz, Traditional Jazz & Ragtime, Vocal Jazz, Oldies, Vocal Pop, Classic Vocalists, Traditional Vocal Pop
Number of Discs: 1
SwapaCD Credits: 1
UPCs: 731453905924, 0731453905924, 042282157621, 042282157645

Synopsis

Amazon.com essential recording
This 1963 session is a fine meeting of two great performers with a single-minded devotion to swing, a high point for both in the decade. The tunes are all familiar standards, many with roots in jazz, while the arrangements by Quincy Jones seem ideal. They're perfectly matched to Count Basie's idiom while providing a fine complement to Ella Fitzgerald's vocal leads. They may possibly be the best settings ever constructed for her scat singing. Fats Waller's "Honeysuckle Rose" swings infectiously and has Fitzgerald scatting ebulliently, while his "Ain't Misbehavin'" becomes a gentle ballad. The same depth of feeling colors "Into Each Life Some Rain Must Fall," while "Satin Doll" insinuates and "Them There Eyes" bounces infectiously from the first beat. --Stuart Broomer

Similarly Requested CDs

 

CD Reviews

The album that made me a jazz fan
Robert James | Culver City, CA USA | 10/21/1999
(5 out of 5 stars)

"This vocal album broke forever my obsession with any music recorded after 1965. The year after I graduated high school, I was given this as a gift by a friend, and I looked at the cover and thought: "Where can I exchange this for something good?" Fortunately, I opened it, played it, and lost my mind for the next month. A hot, swinging session, full of intense emotion, gleeful play, and ravishing talent. I have been in love with Ella ever since; I own almost all of her recordings; I named my daughter after her. If that doesn't convince you to buy this classic, I have wasted my time writing this."
GREAT STUFF!!!!
Darrren12000 | Washington, DC | 09/08/1999
(5 out of 5 stars)

"THIS IS A WONDERFUL ALBUM. A LOT OF ELLA'S MUSIC HAS HER WITH LUSH ACCOMPANYMENT -- STRINGS, ET AL. THIS ALBUM HAS HER WITH THE SWINGING BASIE ORCHESTRA, AND, TRUE TO FORM, BASIE IS ON FIRE!!! HE BRINGS OUT THE SOULFUL ELLA AND I'M SURE SHE STIMULATED THE BAND AS WELL. A MUST HAVE FOR FANS OF GOOD MUSIC -- JAZZ OR OTHERWISE."
For Lovers of Swing
Ori Dagan | Toronto | 07/11/2003
(5 out of 5 stars)

"Absolultely priceless. Ella was always impressive when she had someone to impress, as her collaborations with Satch, Duke, and Louis Jordan prove. This 1963 studio date is certainly a winner. The scat exchange on "Honeysuckle Rose" shows that Ella is in a playful mood. Her phrasing throughout the album is inventive and she eloquently re-melodicizes classic standards like "Ain't Misbehavin'" and "On the Sunny Side of the Street". "Tea for Two" is a lesson in sweet sincerity. "Dream a Little Dream of Me" makes Mama Cass actually seem mediocre and once you hear Ella and Basie do "Deed I Do" it is likely no other version will ever satisfy. Basically (or Basie-cally) the entire album is like a big advertisement for the glory days of swing. God Bless Norman Granz."