Jazz is considered to be one of the most beautiful genres of music because of its unique sound and emotional expression. There were several singers who made jazz music popular for many decades. The whole world was amused by the beauty of jazz performances of such a talented jazz singer as Ella Fitzgerald.
Despite her difficult childhood with tough circumstances, she managed to become a person who had raised jazz music to a much higher level.
First and foremost, she became famous because of her talent being able to sing jazz songs naturally without effort as she had a voice with a wide vocal range about nearly 3 octaves and a unique sense of rhythm and pitch. But the most paradoxical thing about her was “scat” singing.
“Scat” is a type of singing when words are replaced by improvised sounds following the melody; often it reflects different sounds of musical interments. It is a very difficult technique of singing and only few singers could really be good at it and Ella Fitzgerald was one of them.
She made her singing debut when she was 17 at the Apollo Theatre in New York. She impressed the audience of Apollo and won 25 $. First she was going to dance, but suddenly she changed her mind and decided to sing instead. It was her first success that changed her life.
She wasn’t afraid of experimenting with different types of singing and discovered “scat” for her performances. A song “Have to Swing It” was the first time she used improvisation. In her brilliant career she became a master of “scat” and deserved to be called the “Queen of Jazz”. She worked with all great jazz singers from Duke Ellington to Frank Sinatra also including Louis Armstrong, who was the first one to use “scat”.
Ella with her outstanding vocal achieved great success and respect that consequently influenced jazz singers. They became as respectful as jazz instrumentalists. Such famous songs as “Lady be good” and ”How high the moon” showed her talent for improvisation. Listening to these two beautiful songs a person will be amused by her “scat” as it makes songs only better and unique. It is very impressive when a singer can create improvised sounds that go well with a melody using only voice as a musical instrument.
Even nowadays the incomparable voice of Ella Fitzgerald is considered to be the most virtuoso instrument in the history of jazz music. Listening to her songs makes people want to dance going back in time to the 1950s.
Ella Fitzgerald was the most famous female jazz singer in the USA for more than 50 years. In her career, she won many awards and sold more than 40 million albums. She had a beautiful, flexible, wide-ranging voice, so she could sing various types of songs. A very diverse audience listened to her in many countries. People of different nationalities and races, social statuses and religions loved her and admired her songs, especially her ability to “scat” singing.