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By 1955, Norman Granz, founder of Verve Records, had been trying to acquire Ella Fitzgerald as a recording artist for six years, though she’d been a valuable member of his touring jam-session-for-concertgoers – Jazz At The Philharmonic – since 1949. Her tenure at Decca under the canny A&R aegis of Milt Gabler had seen her juggle successful jukebox pop (My Happiness selling 500,000) with artistic successes (the 1950 and 1954 sessions with pianist Ellis Larkins) and a critical reputation that labelled her the First Lady Of Song (she also topped the Metronome and Downbeat polls for years). But Granz had sustained a campaign of public criticism about some of the fluff she was asked to record. ‘He used to have pieces in Downbeat saying how I was destroying her, giving her bad material,’ remembered Gabler.
By 1953 Granz was Ella’s personal manager and announced a substantial Cole Porter songbook project for her. Recorded quickly with over thirty songs being cut in three sessions, there were ‘hardly any second takes,’ remembers pianist Paul Smith, ‘they were just sort of ground out.’ Clearly Granz was desperate for Ella to be associated with Porter’s urbane blend of gently cynical romance (It’s All Right With Me, Just One Of Those Things), sexy comedy (Too Darn Hot, Anything Goes) and elegant, witty sentiment (Ev’ry Time We Say Goodbye, From This Moment On). Ella’s cool, clear delivery suited the material beautifully, although her personality was hardly the sort to overstate Porter’s arch sophistication (‘She is a simple person,’ judged massive fan and fellow jazz singer Mel Torme, ‘her approach to life is simple’), and the songs arrive in deceptively easygoing tones making for a subtle, rewarding listen.
The following few years saw Ella record songbooks of Rodgers and Hart, Duke Ellington and Irving Berlin, a five-album set of George Gershwin and sets of Kern and Mercer. Though some bemoaned the lack of jazz content in the series – and there remains critical dispute as to which songbook is the most artistically successful – Cole Porter was the most popular. ‘I don’t actually like the man,’ said Mel Torme, ‘but I give Norman Granz great credit for saying to Ella, “You are far more than a cult singer, you should be a national treasure,” and that’s what he did for her.’
Frank Sinatra
Songs For Swingin’ Lovers
Sinatra’s sophisticated cool peaks at the dawn of rock’n’roll.
Record label: Capitol
Produced: Voyle Gilmore
Recorded: Capitol Studios, Hollywood; June 1955–January 1956
Released: June 1956
Chart peak: 8 (UK) 2 (US)
Personnel: Frank Sinatra (v); Nelson Riddle (ar); orchestra including Milt Bernhart (tb); Harry Edison, Conrad Gozzo (t); Harry Klee (flute); Mahlon Clark (clarinet)
Track Listing: You Make Me Feel So Young; It Happened In Monterey; You’re Getting To Be A Habit With Me; You Brought A New Kind Of Love To Me; Too Marvellous For Words; Old Devil Moon; Pennies From Heaven; Love Is Here To Stay; I’ve Got You Under My Skin; I Thought About You; We’ll Be Together Again; Makin’ Whoopee; Swingin’ Down The Lane; Anything Goes; How About You?
Running time: 44.51
Current CD: RMG FRC6122
Further listening: Swing Easy (1954); A Swingin’ Affair (1957)
Further reading: Sinatra! The Song Is You: A Singer’s Art (Will Friedwald, 1995); www.franksinatra.com
Download: iTunes
When Capitol vice-president Alan Livingstone announced to their annual convention that he’d signed the down-and-out Sinatra (who had debt, depression and no career prospects), there was an audible groan. Livingstone: ‘My answer to them was, Look, I only know talent, and Frank is the best singer in the world.’ Though humble and grateful, Frank was having a hard time relinquishing his partnership with his ’40s arranger Axel Stordahl. Livingstone was determined to put him together with burgeoning talent Nelson Riddle: ‘Nelson knew how to back up singers and make them sound great.’ Getting to know each other over a few sides, Sinatra was impressed with Riddle’s 1953 treatment of World On A String, but upon hearing his polytonal ballad arranging told pianist Bill Miller, ‘Whew, we gotta be careful with him.’ Miller replied, ‘Hey, Frank, it’s different, it’s working.’
By mid-’55 Sinatra was back on top (thanks to the movie From Here To Eternity and a series of confident albums) and Nelson was forging his distinctive heartbeat tempo, swing-band-plus-strings style that fitted the new Sinatra like a made-to-measure tux. Recasting the repertoire of a previous generation in exhilarating new light and creating new standard songs in the process, Songs For Swingin’ Lovers was the epitome of the rejuvenated, finger-poppin’ Sinatra. Full of lyrical playfulness (‘Stars fractured ’bama last night’) and exuberant re-phrasing (his second chorus of It Happened In Monterey), this music had a vitality and sexiness that made women want to bed him and men want to be him, nowhere more so than in the legend that is the Riddle/Sinatra take on Cole Porter’s I’ve Got You Under My Skin. A brooding, sensuous groove that builds into an explosive, sputtering trombone solo (played by Milt Bernhart over the wrong chords, balancing on a box to get closer to the mike) and pushes on with a hearty ardour before the detumescent coda, it’s one of the most thrilling three and a half minutes in popular music.
While Riddle recognised it as a ‘cornerstone recording for both him and me’, Neal Hefti, the great Basie arranger, said ‘no one has come close to what Nelson achieved with Sinatra … God! That enthusiasm just keeps going on and on and on!’
Johnny Burnette And The Rock’n’Roll Trio
Johnny Burnette And The Rock’n’Roll Trio
Neglected classic from the birth of rock’n’roll.
Record label: Coral
Produced: Owen Bradley
Recorded: Quonset Studio, 16th Avenue South, Nashville; July 2–5, 1956
Released: Autumn 1956
Chart peaks: None (UK) None (US)
Personnel: Johnny Burnette (v, g); Paul Burlison (g); Dorsey Burnette (b); Buddy Harman Jr (d); Owen Bradley (p); Anita Kerr Singers (bv)
Track listing: Honey Hush; Lonesome Train (On A Lonesome Track) (S); Sweet Love On My Mind; Rock Billy Boogie; Lonesome Tears In My Eyes; All By Myself; The Train Kept A-Rollin’ (S); Just Found Out; Your Baby Blue Eyes; Chains Of Love; I Love You So; Drinking Wine Spo-Dee-O-Dee, Drinking Wine
Running time: 26.27
Current CD: BGO CD177 adds Tear It Up album: Tear It Up; You’re Undecided; Oh Baby Babe; Eager Beaver Baby; Touch Me; Midnight Train; If You Want It Enough; Blues Stay Away From Me; Shattered Dreams; My Love, You’re a Stranger; Rock Therapy; Please Don’t Leave Me
Further
