Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Rodgers & Hart Songbook, Vol. 2
Only Frank Sinatra has put his indelible stamp on as many pages of the American Popular Songbook as Ella Fitzgerald. But while Sinatra specialized in mood-themed albums (his composer-based collections were compiled from material already released), Fitzgerald's ambitious songbooks devoted themselves to one great songwriter after another: Cole Porter, the Gershwins, Irving Berlin, Jerome Kern, Harold Arlen, and so on. The two-volume Rodgers and Hart project ranks with the best, and if Buddy Bergman's arrangements are a bit sweeter than his Cole Porter settings, or Nelson Riddle's Gershwin treatments, they suit the material just fine. And what a wide range of material it is (with original verses intact!), intermingling novelty show tunes ("Give it Back to the Indians," "Johnny One Note"), sophisticated standards ("Manhattan," "Blue Moon," "The Lady is a Tramp"), and lush ballads ("Isn't it Romantic," "It Never Entered My Mind"). But for my money, the most exquisite thing Fitzgerald ever recorded is her seven-minute "Bewitched" (a.k.a. "Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered") on Vol. 2, casting a spell of hushed reverie that makes time stand still.--Jim Emerson