Ella on Video Offers High Point at ‘Tribute’

Ella Fitzgerald’s art could always reach out to touch the outermost limits of a venue--whether it was the top rows of the Hollywood Bowl or the back corner table in a small nightclub. It was a touch that bubbled over with exhilaration, with the sheer joy, the natural ingenuousness, of the child that always resided in the heart of her music.

And, like all extraordinarily gifted artists, she did it so well that it seemed easy. But it wasn’t; it was hard.

How hard? Sunday night’s “A Tribute to Ella Fitzgerald” concert at the Hollywood Bowl was an object demonstration. In a lineup that featured Dianne Reeves, the Count Basie Band, Vic Damone, Melissa Manchester and Joe Williams, the highlights of the evening--and the moments that generated the greatest applause from the nearly full house--were provided by large-screen video clips of Fitzgerald in performance.

There was a spirited exchange of scat singing between Fitzgerald, who died just over a year ago at the age of 78, and Mel Torme from a ‘70s Grammy Award show. There were several segments from Fitzgerald’s prime years in the ‘50s, when she was defining the Great American Songbook. And there was a delightful film clip of a 23-year-old Fitzgerald singing “A-Tisket A-Tasket” in the Abbott & Costello film “Ride ‘Em Cowboy.”

In one particularly telling illustration of Fitzgerald’s powers, a film segment of her version of “How High the Moon” was used as a lead-in to a live performance of the tune by an all-star band. Fitzgerald’s singing was explosive, brimming with drive and rhythmic swing. But the band--which included Ray Brown, Louis Bellson, Buddy DeFranco, Harry “Sweets” Edison, Teddy Edwards, Herb Ellis, Terry Gibbs and Mike Wofford--failed to pick up on either her tempo or her buoyant enthusiasm on the film clip. The all-stars, who were on the program to reflect the jam session energies of the Jazz at the Philharmonic concerts that were a staple of Fitzgerald’s activities in the late ‘40s, then stumbled through two more confused numbers that almost completely failed to display their individual talents.

The single performer who might have been expected to capture the Fitzgerald magic was Joe Williams. But a gracious decision to open his brief set with a Fitzgerald original, “You Showed Me the Way”--was followed by two inconsequential songs, “Love You Madly” and “When Did You Leave Heaven?,” neither of which generated the kind of soaring excitement that characterized his occasional duet couplings with the First Lady of Song.

On the plus side, the Basie Band--sounding far better than it did at the recent Playboy Jazz Festival, largely because of proper sound amplification--and Reeves touched some of Fitzgerald’s essence in a driving romp through “Mack the Knife.”

The balance of the show was notable primarily for the peculiarity of the bookings. Damone and Manchester are competent pop artists, but their presence on a jazz tribute to Fitzgerald was, to say the least, baffling. John Pizzarelli, John and Donald Mills, and Nicole Yarling had somewhat closer associations to jazz. But it’s hard to believe, given the rush of new jazz singers arriving on the scene, and given Fitzgerald’s affection for young artists, that the tribute could not have scheduled a stronger, more authentically jazz-based lineup.