More Ella Fitzgerald
- Fitzgerald’s second Songbook release finally arrives on the site with stunning Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound or close to it on all four of these wonderful mono sides
- There’s real Tubey Magic on this album, along with breathy vocals, in-your-listening-room midrange presence and no shortage of swingin’ energy
- We would love to find you a quiet, amazing sounding copy, but that just does not seem to be in the cards
- 5 stars: “The second of Ella Fitzgerald’s famed Songbook series features her singing 34 of the best songs co-written by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart. The arrangements by Buddy Bregman for the string orchestra and big band only border on jazz but she manages to swing the medium-tempo numbers and give sensitivity to the ballads. “
*CONDITION NOTES:
- On side one, a light mark makes 5 very light ticks at the end of track 1, Have You Met Miss Jones?, and 6 light ticks on the intro to track 2, You Took Advantage Of Me.
- On side three, a light mark makes intermittent light to moderate pops on the first half of track 4, I Didn’t Know What Time It Was.
Sometimes the copy with the best sound is not the copy with the quietest vinyl. The best sounding copy is always going to win the shootout, the condition of its vinyl notwithstanding. If you can tolerate the problems on this pressing you are in for some amazing live Sinatra/Basie music and sound. If for any reason you are not happy with the sound or condition of the album we are of course happy to take it back for a full refund, including the domestic return postage.
This vintage Verve pressing has the kind of Tubey Magical Midrange that modern records rarely begin to reproduce. Folks, that sound is gone and it sure isn’t showing any sign of coming back.
Having done this for so long, we understand and appreciate that rich, full, solid, Tubey Magical sound is key to the presentation of this primarily vocal music. We rate these qualities higher than others we might be listening for (e.g., bass definition, soundstage, depth, etc.).
Hot Stamper sound is rarely about the details of a given recording. In the case of this album, more than anything else a Hot Stamper must succeed at recreating a solid, palpable, real Ella Fitzgerald singing live in your listening room. The better copies have an uncanny way of doing just that.
If you exclusively play modern repressings of vintage recordings, I can say without fear of contradiction that you have never heard this kind of sound on vinyl. Old records have it — not often, and certainly not always — but less than one out of 100 new records do, if our experience with the hundreds we’ve played over the years can serve as a guide.
What the best sides of Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Rodgers and Hart Song Book have to offer is not hard to hear:
- Transparency and resolution, critical to hearing into the three-dimensional space of the studio
- The biggest, most immediate staging in the largest acoustic space
- The most Tubey Magic, without which you have almost nothing. CDs give you clean and clear. Only the best vintage vinyl pressings offer the kind of Tubey Magic that was on the tapes in 1956
- Tight, note-like, rich, full-bodied bass, with the correct amount of weight down low
- Natural tonality in the midrange — with all the instruments having the correct timbre
No doubt there’s more but we hope that should do for now. Playing the record is the only way to hear all of the qualities we discuss above, and playing the best pressings against a pile of other copies under rigorously controlled conditions is the only way to find a pressing that sounds as good as this one does.
Copies with rich lower mids and nice extension up top did the best in our shootout, assuming they weren’t veiled or smeary of course. So many things can go wrong on a record! We know, we’ve heard them all.
Top end extension is critical to the sound of the best copies. Lots of old records (and new ones) have no real top end; consequently, the studio or stage will be missing much of its natural air and space, and instruments will lack their full complement of harmonic information.
Tube smear is common to most vintage pressings and this is no exception. The copies that tend to do the best in a shootout will have the least (or none), yet are full-bodied, tubey and rich.
What We’re Listening For on Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Rodgers and Hart Song Book
- Energy for starters. What could be more important than the life of the music?
- The Big Sound comes next — wall to wall, lots of depth, huge space, three-dimensionality, all that sort of thing.
- Then transient information — fast, clear, sharp attacks, not the smear and thickness common to most LPs.
- Tight, note-like bass with clear fingering — which ties in with good transient information, as well as the issue of frequency extension further down.
- Next: transparency — the quality that allows you to hear deep into the soundfield, showing you the space and air around all the players.
- Extend the top and bottom and voila, you have The Real Thing — an honest to goodness Hot Stamper.
TRACK LISTING
Side One
Have You Met Miss Jones?
You Took Advantage Of Me
A Ship Without A Sail
To Keep My Love Alive
Dancing On The Ceiling
The Lady Is A Tramp
With A Song In My Heart
Manhattan
Side Two
Johnny One Note
I Wish I Were In Love Again
Spring Is Here
It Never Entered My Mind
This Can’t Be Love
Thou Swell
My Romance
Where Or When
Little Girl Blue
Side Three
Give It Back To The Indians
Ten Cents A Dance
There’s A Small Hotel
I Didn’t Know What Time It Was
Everything I’ve Got
I Could Write A Book
Blue Room
My Funny Valentine
Side Four
Bewitched
Mountain Greenery
Wait Til You See Her
Lover
Isn’t It Romantic
Here In My Arms
Blue Moon
My Heart Stood Still
I’ve Got Five Dollars
AMG 5 Star Rave Review
The second of Ella Fitzgerald’s famed Songbook series features her singing 34 of the best songs co-written by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart. The arrangements by Buddy Bregman for the string orchestra and big band only border on jazz but she manages to swing the medium-tempo numbers and give sensitivity to the ballads.
With such songs as “You Took Advantage of Me,” “The Lady Is a Tramp,” “It Never Entered My Mind,” “Where or When,” “My Funny Valentine,” and “Blue Moon,” it is not too surprising that these recordings (originally released on a two-LP set) were so popular.