Ella Fitzgerald

At 79 years old, Ella Fitzgerald has this physical status:

Ella Jane Fitzgerald (April 25, 1917 – June 15, 1996) was an American jazz musician who was sometimes referred to as the First Lady of Song, Queen of Jazz, and Lady Ella.

She was known for her impeccable tone, impeccable pronunciation, phrasing, intonation, and a "horn-like" improvisational talent, especially in her scat singing. Fitzgerald found peace with the Chick Webb Orchestra after a turbulent teenage years, but was most associated with the Savoy Ballroom in Harlem.

Her interpretation of the nursery rhyme "A-Tisket, A-Tasket" helped both her and Webb gain national recognition.

Fitzgerald left the band behind in 1942 when it was taken over by Webb, who died. Moe Gale, the Savoy's co-founder, died before she handed over the rest of her career to Norman Granz, who established Verve Records to produce new Fitzgerald songs.

Verve released some of her most well-known pieces, including her interpretations of the Great American Songbook. Although Fitzgerald appeared in films and as a guest on popular television shows in the second half of the twentieth century, her musical appearances with Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, and The Ink Spots were among her best known performances outside of her solo career.

"Dream a Little Dream of Me," "Cheek to Cheek," "In Everyday Life" and "It Don't Mean a Thing" were two of her best-known songs, including "Dream a Little Dream of Me," "Cheek to Cheek," "Into Each Life Some Rain Must Fall" and "It Don't Mean a Thing" ("If It Ain't Got That Swing). She appeared in 1993 after a career of nearly 60 years, giving her last public appearance.

She died at the age of 79 after years of declining health.

Her awards included fourteen Grammy Awards, the National Medal of Arts, and the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Early life

Fitzgerald was born in Newport News, Virginia, on April 25, 1917. In the 1920 census, she was both William Fitzgerald and Temperance "Tempie" Henry's daughter and was described as "mulatto" by her. She was single, but she and her parents were married in Newport News' East End section for at least two and a half years, when she was born. Fitzgerald's mother and her new partner, Joseph da Silva, immigrated to Yonkers, New York, in the early 1920s. Frances da Silva, her half-sister who stayed close to for the majority of her life, was born in 1923. Fitzgerald and her family had migrated to nearby School Street, a poor Italian neighborhood, by 1925. She began formal education at the age of six and was a good student, progressing through a number of colleges before enrolling Benjamin Franklin Junior High School in 1929.

Fitzgerald loved dancing and admired Earl Snakehips Tucker, beginning in third grade. On the way to school and at lunchtime, she did a good job for her peers. She and her family were Methodist and were active in the Bethany African Methodist Episcopal Church, where she attended worship services, Bible study, and Sunday school. Fitzgerald was given a personal memory of her involvement in music by the cathedral.

Fitzgerald listened to jazz recordings by Louis Armstrong, Bing Crosby, and The Boswell Sisters. "My mother brought one of her songs home, and I fell in love with it," she said later.

Her mother died of injuries suffered in a car crash in 1932, when Fitzgerald was 15 years old. When she left Harlem to live with her aunt, her stepfather took care of her until April 1933. Da Silva may have abused her this quickly, and Fitzgerald biographer Stuart Nicholson says it was backed up by reports of "ill care" by her stepfather.

Fitzgerald began skipping school, and her grades plummeted. She served as a lookout at a bordello and as the Mafia-affiliated numbers runner. She had never openly discussed this period in her life. She was taken in the Colored Orphanage in Riverdale, Bronx, when the authorities caught her up. She was moved to the New York Training School for Girls, a state reformatory school in Hudson, New York, as the orphanage became too crowded.

Personal life

Fitzgerald married at least twice, and there is evidence that she may have married a third time. Benny Kornegay, a convicted drug dealer and local dockworker, was married in 1941. In 1942, the marriage was annulled. Ray Brown, the well-known bass player who had performed while on tour with Dizzy Gillespie's band a year earlier, married her second time in December 1947. The child was largely raised by his mother's aunt, Virginia, as they adopted a child born to Fitzgerald's half-sister, Frances, who they christened Ray Brown Jr. Fitzgerald and Brown were divorced in 1953 due to the many work pressures both of them were facing at the time, but they would continue to perform together.

Fitzgerald had secretly married Thor Einar Larsen, a young Norwegian, in Oslo in July 1957. She had even gone as far as furnishing an apartment in Oslo, but Larsen was quickly dismissed when she was sentenced to five months of hard work in Sweden for stealing money from a young woman to whom he had never been committed.

Fitzgerald was notoriously cynical. Mario Bauzá, a Trumpet player who competed alongside Fitzgerald in her early years with Chick Webb, remembered that "she didn't hang out much." She was committed to her music when she joined the band: She was a lonely teenager in New York who "just kept herself to herself for the gig." Fitzgerald said, "I don't want to say the wrong thing, which I do well, but I think I do better when I sing."

Fitzgerald lived in St. Albans, New York, an enclave of wealthy African Americans, where she counted among her neighbors, Illinois Jacquet, Lena Horne, and other jazz luminaries from 1949 to 1956.

Fitzgerald was a civil rights lawyer who used her skills to crack racial barriers around the country. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People Equal Justice Award and the American Black Achievement Award were given to her by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People Equal Justice Award and the American Black Achievement Award. Norman Granz recruited Fitzgerald for the Jazz at the Philharmonic tour in 1949. The Jazz at the Philharmonic tour will specifically target segregated venues. Granz ordered promoters to ensure that there was no "colored" or "white" seating. Fitzgerald was guaranteed equal pay and accommodation despite her gender and ethnicity. Shows were cancelled if the circumstances were not fulfilled.

Bill Reed, author of Hot From Harlem: Twelve African American Entertainers, referred to Fitzgerald as the "Civil Rights Crusader" who suffered discrimination throughout her life. In 1954, on her way to one of her performances in Australia, she was unable to board the Pan American flight due to racial discrimination. Despite many challenges and racial barriers, she was branded as a "cultural ambassador" for 1987 and America's highest non-military award, the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Fitzgerald founded the Ella Fitzgerald Charitable Foundation in 1993, focusing on charitable grants for four key areas: academic, music education, basic care for the less fortunate, and medical research on diabetes, heart disease, and vision impairment. Her aim was to give back and provide opportunities to those who were "at risk" and those who were less fortunate. In addition, she helped many non-profit groups, such as the American Heart Association, City of Hope, and the Retina Foundation.

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Early career

Fitzgerald appears to have lived through 1933 and 1934 in part by performing on Harlem's streets, but she made her most popular debut at the age of 17, 1934, in one of the first Amateur Nights at the Apollo Theater. She had intended to perform and dance but was threatened by a local dance duo called the Edwards Sisters, who forced her to perform instead. She performed "Judy" and "The Object of My Affection" and received the first prize, according to Connee Boswell. She was destined to appear at the Apollo for a week but, apparently due to her disheveled appearance, the theater never gave her the opportunity.

Fitzgerald was given the opportunity to appear with the Tiny Bradshaw band at the Harlem Opera House in January 1935. Chick Webb, the drummer and bandleader who had recently signed Charlie Linton, was given the opportunity to find her a female singer. Despite Webb's reluctant to sign her "because she was gawky and unkempt," he said, a 'diamond in the rough,'" she was offered the opportunity to test with his band when they met during a dance at Yale University.

Fitzgerald was asked to join Webb's orchestra and received acclaim as part of the group's performances in Harlem's Savoy Ballroom, and was welcomed by both audiences and colleagues. "Love and Kisses" and "(If You Can't Sing It) You'll Have to Swing It" are two Fitzgerald hits, as well as "(Mr. Paganini)" and "(If You Can't Avoid It)" (Mr. Paganini). However, it was her 1938 version of the nursery rhyme "A-Tisket, A-Tasket," a song she co-wrote that earned her public acclaim. On the radio, "A-Tisket, A-Tasket" became a big hit, and it was also one of the decade's biggest-selling songs.

Webb died of spinal tuberculosis on June 16, 1939, and his band, Ella and Her Famous Orchestra, was renamed Ella and Her Famous Orchestra, with Fitzgerald taking over as the bandleader. Between 1935 and 1942, she performed nearly 150 songs with Webb's orchestra. Fitzgerald also appeared and recorded with the Benny Goodman Orchestra in addition to her Webb work. Ella Fitzgerald and Her Savoy Eight were among her side projects.

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