Music Review: Ella Fitzgerald is in fine form on 1967 concert album, ‘Ella at the Coliseum’
Music Review: Ella Fitzgerald is in fine form on 1967 concert album, ‘Ella at the Coliseum’
The setting is less grand than suggested by the title of a new Ella Fitzgerald album, “The Moment of Truth: Ella at the Coliseum.” In this case, the coliseum is not in Rome or Los Angeles, but the Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum Arena in Oakland, California.
Jazz giant Fitzgerald’s presence elevated any event, however, and that was the case on June 30, 1967, when she performed at a concert that also included The Duke Ellington Orchestra and other luminaries.
“The Moment of Truth” documents Fitzgerald’s set, and her incomparable alto is in typically fine form. She bounces and glides, blares and coos, bellows and whoops and scats and swings to the audience’s delight. “If you love her, clap!” someone shouts.
The album, which will be released Friday, features performances of nine songs unearthed from the private tape collection of Verve Records founder Norman Granz. The vinyl release offers outstanding sound quality and extensive, informative liner notes by the critic Will Friedwald. He notes that while it was unusual for Fitzgerald to sing contemporary pop tunes, the set includes her only known performance of two classics from the mid-1960s — the Burt Bacharach and Hal David penned “Alfie” and Bob Crewe’s “Music to Watch Girls By.”
Fitzgerald is accompanied by a piano trio, and on several songs by the Ellington orchestra, with whom she had a lengthy 1960s collaboration. Ellington doesn’t play, however, and the understated arrangements leave the spotlight entirely to Fitzgerald. She’s in a playful mood in her on stage banter, teasing a late arrival, impersonating Louis Armstrong, and ruling out a striptease.
Her singing is radiant as she turns sophisticated melodies into a thrill ride. Their direction is as unpredictable as a pinball, with rhythmic daring and inventiveness that could make an arena sway. And it probably did.
Fitzgerald flies high on “Mack the Knife,” and displays jazzy verve on Benny Goodman’s “Don’t Be That Way” and the Tony Bennett staple “The Moment of Truth,” while “You’ve Changed” shimmers with bluesy beauty. On “Let’s Do It (Let’s Fall in Love),” her phrasing is as clever as Cole Porter’s lyrics. In her version, she injects references to the Beatles,James Bond, Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor.
As Friedwald notes, Fitzgerald rarely drew from the Burt Bacharach-Hal David catalogue. But her interpretation of their classic ballad “Alfie” is a marvel of technique, emotional investment and creativity, including a brief digression. Fitzgerald navigates the complicated melody and rhythm with ease. It’s an exemplar of the album, because as always, in keeping with the advice of the lyrics, her heart leads the way.
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By STEVEN WINE
Associated Press
