Ella Fitzgerald
Ella Jane Fitzgerald was born on the 25th of April 1917, in Newport News, Virginia. Her mother Temperance Fitzgerald and father William Ashland Fitzgerald lived together for two and a half years before moving to Yonkers, New York, in the early 1920s. By 1925, the family settled on School Street, a poor Italian area where Ella attended Benjamin Franklin Junior High School starting in 1929. She grew up Methodist and found her earliest musical experiences at the Bethany African Methodist Episcopal Church. Her stepfather Joseph da Silva moved into their lives after her parents separated, but rumors of ill treatment surfaced later.
Tragedy struck when her mother died from injuries sustained in a car accident in 1932. At age fifteen, Ella moved to Harlem to live with her aunt. This change in circumstances coincided with her skipping school and working as a lookout at a bordello alongside a Mafia-affiliated numbers runner. When authorities caught up with her, she was placed in the Colored Orphan Asylum in Riverdale. The orphanage proved too crowded, so she was transferred to the New York Training School for Girls, a state reformatory school in Hudson, New York.
Fitzgerald debuted at age seventeen on the 21st of November 1934, during one of the earliest Amateur Nights at the Apollo Theater. She intended to dance but felt intimidated by a local dance duo called the Edwards Sisters and chose to sing instead. Performing in the style of Connee Boswell, she sang Judy and The Object of My Affection before winning first prize. Although she won the chance to perform at the Apollo for a week, the theater never gave her that part of her prize due to her disheveled appearance.
In January 1935, Fitzgerald won the opportunity to perform for a week with the Tiny Bradshaw band at the Harlem Opera House. Later that year, drummer Bardu Ali introduced her to bandleader Chick Webb. Webb was reluctant to sign her because she was gawky and unkempt, calling her a diamond in the rough. After convincing Webb, he offered Fitzgerald the chance to test with his band at a dance at Yale University. Met with approval from audiences and fellow musicians, she joined Webb's orchestra and gained acclaim performing at Harlem's Savoy Ballroom.
As the swing era waned, bebop led to new developments in Fitzgerald's vocal style through her work with Dizzy Gillespie's big band. It was during this period that she began including scat singing as a major part of her performance repertoire. While singing with Gillespie, Fitzgerald recalled trying to do with her voice what she heard the horns in the band doing. Her 1945 scat recording of Flying Home arranged by Vic Schoen would later be described by The New York Times as one of the most influential vocal jazz records of the decade.
Fitzgerald's bebop recording of Oh Lady Be Good! released in 1947 increased her reputation as one of the leading jazz vocalists. Critics noted that while other singers like Louis Armstrong had tried similar improvisation, no one before Miss Fitzgerald employed the technique with such dazzling inventiveness. This shift marked a turning point where she realized there was more to music than just bop, eventually leading her toward broader musical horizons under Norman Granz's management.
Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Cole Porter Song Book released in 1956 became the first of eight Song Book sets she recorded for Verve Records at irregular intervals from 1956 to 1964. These albums represented an attempt by Fitzgerald to cross over into a non-jazz audience and included standards ranging from popular hits to rare compositions. The Duke Ellington Song Book stood out because the composer played on exactly half the set's thirty-eight tracks alongside his collaborator Billy Strayhorn. They even wrote two new pieces of music specifically for the album titled The E and D Blues and a four-movement musical portrait of Fitzgerald.
The New York Times described these albums among the first pop records to devote serious attention to individual songwriters. Frank Rich wrote days after her death that Fitzgerald performed a cultural transaction as extraordinary as Elvis Presley's contemporaneous integration of white and African-American soul. Her work helped establish the pop album as a vehicle for serious musical exploration while popularizing urban songs often written by immigrant Jews to a national audience of predominantly white Christians.
In July 1954, Fitzgerald made her first tour of Australia for promoter Lee Gordon but faced severe racial discrimination during travel. Although all four members of her entourage held first-class tickets on their scheduled Pan-American Airlines flight from Honolulu to Australia, they were ordered to leave the aircraft after boarding. They were refused permission to re-board to retrieve luggage and clothing, leaving them stranded in Honolulu for three days before flying to Sydney. A contemporary Australian press report denied the incident was racially based, yet Fitzgerald, her cousin Georgiana Henry, pianist John Lewis, and manager Norman Granz filed a civil suit for racial discrimination against Pan-Am in December 1954.
They won the appeal in January 1956 and received what Fitzgerald called a nice settlement years later. This experience highlighted her role as a Civil Rights Crusader facing barriers throughout her career. In 1949, Norman Granz recruited her for Jazz at the Philharmonic tours that specifically targeted segregated venues. Granz required promoters to ensure no colored or white seating existed and guaranteed equal pay regardless of sex or race. If conditions were not met, shows were cancelled.
Fitzgerald suffered from diabetes for several years of her later life which led to numerous complications requiring hospitalization in 1985, 1986, and 1990. In March 1990 she appeared at the Royal Albert Hall in London with the Count Basie Orchestra for the launch of Jazz FM plus a gala dinner at the Grosvenor House Hotel. By 1993 both of her legs were amputated below the knee due to the effects of diabetes, a condition that also damaged her eyesight. She made her last recording in 1991 and her final public performances two years later.
Ella died in her home from a stroke on the 15th of June 1996, at age seventy-nine. A few hours after her death the Playboy Jazz Festival launched at the Hollywood Bowl with a marquee reading Ella We Will Miss You. Her funeral was private and she was buried at Inglewood Park Cemetery in California. Despite declining health she had maintained a career spanning nearly sixty years before passing away.
Fitzgerald won thirteen Grammy Awards and received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1967. She became the first African-American woman to win at the inaugural show in 1958. Other major honors included the Kennedy Center Medal of Honor Award, National Medal of Art, Presidential Medal of Freedom, and honorary doctorates from Yale University in 1986 and Harvard University four years later. The Smithsonian Institution houses her career history while the Library of Congress holds her personal music arrangements.
In 2007 the United States Postal Service released a stamp honoring Fitzgerald as part of their Black Heritage series. Google featured her in a Doodle on the 25th of April 2013, celebrating what would have been her ninety-sixth birthday. A bronze sculpture stands in Yonkers created by artist Vinnie Bagwell near the Amtrak station. Ann Hampton Callaway, Dee Dee Bridgewater, and Patti Austin recorded tribute albums including To Ella with Love and Dear Ella. Rolling Stone ranked her number forty-five on their list of two hundred greatest singers of all time in 2023.
Continue Browsing
Common questions
When and where was Ella Fitzgerald born?
Ella Jane Fitzgerald was born on the 25th of April 1917, in Newport News, Virginia. Her parents lived together for two and a half years before moving to Yonkers, New York, in the early 1920s.
How did Ella Fitzgerald start her professional singing career?
Fitzgerald debuted at age seventeen on the 21st of November 1934, during one of the earliest Amateur Nights at the Apollo Theater. She won first prize by singing Judy and The Object of My Affection after initially intending to dance.
What role did Chick Webb play in Ella Fitzgerald's music development?
Drummer Bardu Ali introduced Fitzgerald to bandleader Chick Webb who eventually signed her to his orchestra despite initial reluctance about her appearance. She gained acclaim performing at Harlem's Savoy Ballroom with Webb's band.
Why is Ella Fitzgerald known for scat singing?
Fitzgerald began including scat singing as a major part of her performance repertoire while working with Dizzy Gillespie's big band. Her 1945 scat recording of Flying Home arranged by Vic Schoen became one of the most influential vocal jazz records of the decade.
Did Ella Fitzgerald face racial discrimination during international tours?
In July 1954, Fitzgerald faced severe racial discrimination when Pan-American Airlines ordered her entourage to leave an aircraft in Honolulu due to their race. They were refused permission to re-board to retrieve luggage and clothing before filing a civil suit against the airline in December 1954.
How did diabetes affect the end of Ella Fitzgerald's life?
Ella suffered from diabetes which led to complications requiring hospitalization in 1985, 1986, and 1990. By 1993 both of her legs were amputated below the knee due to the effects of diabetes and she died on the 15th of June 1996 at age seventy-nine.