(...) Strangely enough I was never attracted to Billie or Ella as a kid. Even when I was A&R head and arranging for Verve. But now that I'm older, I can feel/hear Billie's pain and Ella's shyness, only coming out of her shell when she really 'felt' the music.
It's only recently I found out about Ella being orphaned and having to live on the street and I was with her in heavy daily bursts which would include rehearsals, recordings, and sometime social activity it never came up. Months would go by when she was on tour and then the Ella merry-go-round would start over once again. Over a 2-year period it happened 4 times: Cole Porter Song Book, Rodgers & Hart SongBook, singles sessions, and Las Vegas Act for the New Frontier (co-starring along with Mario Lanza; my future sister-in-law and I hanging around the same hotel obviously not knowing each other at the time).
When Ella and I checked in, our rooms were not ready and we had to sit on a couch near the gaming tables. This was at a time when colored people cleaned the hotels, not starred at one. So she was conspicuous. Also, no one really recognized her, as a black jazz artist had never headlined a main room. I was very much at home, having arranged all the music for two giant dance numbers (6 weeks rehearsal + 2 in Vegas) with the crème de la crème of Broadway in the chorus, choreographed by the wonderful, insane, crazy Robert Alton of "Pal Joey" (new version) fame, which my Uncle Jule had recently produced.
So I asked Ella if she'd like to gamble. She said, "No, honey, here, you go [placed a hundred dollar bill in my palm] and put this on black!" So, being as full of myself as I was in those days, our conversations only consisted of (after a few "you, you, you") a lot of "I, I, I."
I talked a lot about social life not social issues. But Ella only talked about music, nothing very personal. She seemed shy and not at all like any of the young girl singers and actresses I hung around with. I always watched what I said, as if she were a matriarchal Bregman like my grandmother, so it usually was strained at best, until I hit the piano and she sat on a stool nearby, then we were both in our professional element and it was better. But I was always cognizant of who she was and was constantly in a very kind and deferential mode. Even if we were totally in a social arena and not working together it was an 'adult deferential respectful' mode.
I would always take over in a restaurant to make sure there were no problems. I always watched out for that. She was at her heaviest when we worked together. And I always had an arm out to help her.
Ella & Buddy, durante la grabación de "The Cole Porter Songbook"
Even I was shy around her, as I never wanted to say the wrong thing. Even after rehearsal and I took her back to The Watkins Hotel where she lived and we had a drink at the bar after 3-4 hours of rehearsal, I was cautious. I was also the only white person in the place. They all liked me there. I even sat in with the trio; Milt Buckner on organ, I'd play the piano and Ella would sing along or just enjoy the music. Not my piano playing, she had had enough of that!
Dinah Washington stuck her head out of the window when I picked Ella up one day and said, "Who's that cute young boy you got with you, Ella?" "You just leave Buddy alone, Dinah, he's my friend."
That's why we worked so well together - oil and water - a well-to-do kid from Chicago and an orphaned middle-aged black jazz singer from New York; Ella Fitzgerald and Buddy Bregman; Ella and Cole; Ella and Rodgers & Hart; a jazz singer singing show tunes.
I had that idea for a long time. I always (and still do) loved show tunes. They said so much. Although I didn't always like the interpretations. I thought there was a better way to 'get down' with them. Although, I must say, no one has ever sung Porter better than Merman and Bobby Short and no one has ever sung Rodgers & Hart better than Mabel Mercer and Bobby Short. And I guess I found that middle ground.
Ella and Buddy found a way to do both. Had I been a young guy who had been with a band or had experience arranging for bands before I got with Verve (even though I had recorded with the likes of Bobby Short just before Ella and done the charts for lots of the line numbers at various Las Vegas Hotels: The Sahara, New Frontier, The Sands, Flamingo and The Tropicana) it would have been easier for all concerned and the results even better. But I was right out of college with no real big band experience. So, where I was personally concerned, Ella didn't have a place to share similar experiences.
But we did it, and I had had the idea of doing the monster Broadway songs with one singer since I was 11. I think there were times when my musical charts restricted Ella. Anyone's big band charts would have. She was obviously better off with the trio that, of course, took no talent on my part as an arranger.
But on the "TOO DARN HOT" track in the Cole Porter SongBook, I think that really was a great blending of Ella's and my talent!
I got to know Ella Fitzgerald quite well personally, while I was recording with her over a couple of years which included many singles as well as the Cole Porter Songbook and the Rodgers & Hart Songbook.
(Fuente: http://www.buddybregman.com/ella.html)
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