Ella fitzgerald biography youtube leonardo da vinci

In her lifetime, she won 13 Grammy awards and sold over 40 million albums. Her voice was flexible, wide-ranging, accurate and ageless. She could sing sultry ballads, sweet jazz and imitate every instrument in an orchestra.

Discover how Ella Fitzgerald defied the odds to become one of the most revered musicians of the 20th century.

Or rather, some might say all the jazz greats had the pleasure of working with Ella. She performed at top venues all over the world, and packed them to the hilt. Her audiences were as diverse as her vocal range. They were rich and poor, made up of all races, all religions and all nationalities.

The Ella Fitzgerald story clearly would never make a motion picture; she has had no troubles with booze or drugs, is friendly with her ex-husband, Ray Brown, and virtually .

In fact, many of them had just one binding factor in common — they all loved her. Her father, William, and mother, Temperance Tempie , parted ways shortly after her birth. Together, Tempie and Ella went to Yonkers, N. To support the family, Joe dug ditches and was a part-time chauffeur, while Tempie worked at a laundromat and did some catering. Occasionally, Ella took on small jobs to contribute money as well.

Their apartment was in a mixed neighborhood, where Ella made friends easily. She considered herself more of a tomboy, and often joined in the neighborhood games of baseball. Sports aside, she enjoyed dancing and singing with her friends, and some evenings they would take the train into Harlem and watch various acts at the Apollo Theater.