Ella Fitzgerald spent the last part of her life here in Los
Angeles. She had a mansion in Beverly Hills and after she died in 1996, was
buried at Inglewood Park Cemetery. She would have turned 100 on April 25, and
the celebrations have begun... including at the brand new California Jazz and
Blues Museum in Leimert Park, which is presided over by LA's own first lady of
song, Barbara Morrison.
Off-Ramp contributor Sean
J. O'Connell met Morrison at the museum this week to talk about Ella's life and
legacy. Make sure to listen to the entire interview in the audio player so you
can hear Barbara give scatting advice, and give us a beautiful a
capella version of Make Someone Happy.
DO
YOU REMEMBER THE FIRST TIME YOU HEARD ELLA FITZGERALD?
I do. I was probably about
ten years old. My dad had a hi-fi. And he played all the old songs of the great
black singers in the day. And we had the first black radio station. It was in
Inkster, Michigan. That's all he listened to.
DID
SHE IMMEDIATELY APPEAL TO YOU?
No, I liked Dinah
Washington and Ruth Brown. I liked the more bluesy stuff. But she was artistic,
and that part of her I did like. She was more creative. She took leaps and
bounds. You know, sitting on the bandstand with Chick Webb when you're a little
kid and you got all these professional horn players blowing all kinds of solos.
She had a photographic memory. She could remember all that stuff. She could
remember what Johnny Hodges was playing in his solo, and she could sing it.
WHAT
WAS PEAK ELLA?
"Ella in
Berlin." When she did "Mack the Knife" and forgot the words. I
think that really really really made her famous because she carried that whole
thing, but she made it all work. I think people appreciated that, because
that's how life is. You know? You make it work.
Morrison just christened the California Jazz
and Blues Museum at 4317 Degnan Blvd 90008 which has a corner devoted to Ella.
"It's called Ella's Pub," Morrison says, because "Dizzy and all
the cats would come to town, and instead of hanging out in nightclubs where
people would bother them, they'd go to Ella's house and she had a pub in her
rec room and they'd all jam all night - Oscar Peterson and everybody."
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