[Dixielandjazz] Ella Fitzgerald reviewed

[Robert Ringwald]

The Complete Chick Webb and Ella Fitzgerald Decca Sessions
(1934-1941)
(8 discs, by mail only from Mosaic Records, 425 Fairfield Ave.,
Suite 421, Stamford, Conn. 06902 or from
www.mosaicrecords.com
)
by Jeff Simon
Buffalo News, October 25, 2013
Here is John McDonough of Down Beat and NPR on the historical
singularity of the newest exemplary set of golden archive jazz
discs from the incomparable Mosaic Records: "If your plan here
had been to collect only the complete instrumental work of the
Chick Webb orchestra on Decca, it would have been a sweet but
slim project indeed -- barely a single CD, in fact. Of the 129
commercial sides and alternates he recorded between September
1934 and his death in June 1939, only 23 were instrumental. Never
in jazz history did a major swing band ever come to be so
dominated by a single singer." And that's because those records
were the recording birth of one of the handful of greatest
singers jazz will ever have -- Ella Fitzgerald. There is no
question that the greatest Ella occupies about a decade and a
half of recording -- from, say, 1952 to 1967, years when her work
schedule was merciless and some of the greatest jazz vocal
recordings in the music's history were made by her. But you
understand her history better when you hear this music, from the
period in 1935 when she came into the Webb band which soon, says
McDonough, "became hostage to her swelling stardom," a stardom
that, blessedly, could ignore visual appearance and give her love
simply by sound alone through the radio. And that's what
happened. By 20, she was the leading singer in the country, even
though it took critic George Simon and musician Benny Carter to
get the word out among the jazz people who counted. But none of
it would have happened if Chick Webb hadn't discovered her and
protected and nurtured her. All of her important early recording
history is here -- as auspicious an opening act in jazz singing
as there is, accompanied by a great jazz band that should have
recorded more on its own before its leader's demise. And, as
always, perfectly presented by Mosaic.
-30-


-Bob Ringwald K6YBV
www.ringwald.com
916/ 806-9551

"If you don't know where you're going, you might end up some place else."
-Lawrence Peter (Yogi) Berra