Ella Fitzgerald Porgy

Ella Fitzgerald didn't lack for live recording opportunities in the late '50s, which on the surface, would make this first issue of a 1958 Chicago live club date an easy one to pass on. Verve label head Norman Granz recorded her often in the '50s with an eye to releasing live albums, which he did with her shows at Newport in 1957 and Los Angeles' Opera House in 1958 (not to mention another 1958 concert in Rome that was released 30 years later to wide acclaim). Those shows, however, differed widely from this one, which found her in front of a very small audience at Chicago's jazz Mecca Mister Kelly's (Sarah Vaughan's landmark At Mister Kelly's was recorded there four months earlier)…

The Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong edition of Verve's long-running Compact Jazz series of reissues condenses three remarkable albums - 1955's Ella and Louis, 1956's Ella and Louis Again, and 1958's Porgy and Bess - into a fantastic 12-track collection. Of course, you could pick and random assortment of 12 tracks from these three discs and have a collection of fantastic merit, but these specific performances are particularly outstanding. Opening with a swinging "They Can't Take That Away From Me," Compact Jazz emphasizes the more playful side of the Fitzgerald/Armstrong collaborations, downplaying the more serious Porgy and Bess material - a lovely take of "Summertime" an exception - in favor of giddy versions of standards like "I Won't Dance" and "Let's Call the Whole Thing Off." There's an exuberant joy in this music that won't fail to charm even the most hard-hearted listener.