ella pops

amongst the vicissitudes of love and its weird or spectral simulacra, its multiplicitous ectoplasmic semblances, watcha listenin to, crispy? oh i'll tell you what, early ella fitzgerald. go download the war years. ella's mature or even very late artistry was devastating; i would definitely steer everybody away from the songbooks, though, and i say that emphatically. the orchestrations there are way too big; specifically, they are way too  big to swing. ella without swing is ridiculous; she was the best swing vocalist by some distance. the idea that she's recording in front of a big string section reading sheet music is sad. anyway, though, she had something early on that she didn't later: a gossamer girlish upper end. man she was poppin and boppin before there was any such thing. on a lovelorn song she is a match for billie as an interpreter; often early on she is notably economical. but only she just never was actually sad like billie so like this little glow of joy always comes through that translucent surface. oh then of course there is the best scatting ever by a ways, etc. alright she was 27 when she hit this, though this shows a bit of the darker potential.