ELLA FITZGERALD - RODGERS & HART SONG (180g IMPORT 2LP)

It’s something everyone has experienced: whether at one of the great jazz festivals in Berlin, Montreux or Paris, or in a small, provincial jazz club which exudes the charm of a dingy jazz cavern in the Fifties - you sit, listen, and then rack your brain to remember the name of the number which the young jazz musician is playing with all his heart. Just what was the name?

Put the 'Ella Sings The Rodgers And Hart Song Book' album on your turntable and you’re guaranteed to recall “My Funny Valentine”, “Blue Moon” and “It Never Entered My Mind”. All these and many more excellent ballads flowed out of the pens of the songwriting team - and each and every one of them is a winner.

But don’t make the mistake of associating merely scat singing taken at a cracking pace with the most famous (the name ‘Ella’ is a fully adequate epithet) and the BEST (for that’s what she is and she will remain so!) jazz vocalist between 1930 and 1995: this album more than demonstrates her excellent powers of expression and her brilliant modulations. The ballads are done true justice in these sensitive, almost subdued arrangements by the West Coast film music expert Buddy Bregman, which put Ella’s voice, Richard Rodgers’ melodies and Lorenz Hart’s lyrics in the limelight. With the exception of “Blue Moon”, all the numbers are themes taken from Broadway musicals, virtually none of which will ever have been seen by us, but whose evergreen melodies will remain in our memories for ever.
What is more, there is a special treat for us in store on this album: three titles are now appearing on stereo-LP for the very first time. A further milestone along the road of jazz singing is at last re-released with this song book: it constitutes an important documentation of Ella’s musical path which began with the children’s song “A-tisket, a-tasket”.

  1.    A Ship Without Sail 
  2.    Bewitched 
  3.    Blue Moon 
  4.    Dancing On The Ceiling 
  5.    Give It Back To The Indians 
  6.    Have You Met Miss Jones? 
  7.    I Could Write A Book 
  8.    I Didn't Know What Time It Was 
  9.    Isn't It Romantic 
  10.    I Wish I Were In Love Again 
  11.    It Never Entered My Mind 
  12.    Johnny One Note 
  13.    Little Girl Blue 
  14.    Lover 
  15.    Manhatten 
  16.    Mountain Greenery 
  17.    My Funny Valentine 
  18.    My Romance 
  19.    Spring Is Here 
  20.    Ten Cents A Dance 
  21.    The Lady Is A Tramp 
  22.    There's A Small Hotel 
  23.    This Can't Be Love 
  24.    Thou Swell 
  25.    Wait Till You See Her 
  26.    Where Or When 
  27.    You Took Advantage Of Me