Ella at The Coliseum

Ella Fitzgerald virtually invented the live album. The reason is simple: her performances were so consistently great that almost any live show was special enough to release as a record. In a sense, for Ella Fitzgerald, every night was 'The Moment of Truth'. Mixed directly from 4-track tapes recorded by Wally Heider-resulting in higher-fidelity audio than most `lost' recordings. Ella's band features the rarely-heard but hard-swinging trio of Jimmy Jones, Bob Cranshaw and Sam Woodyard. The Ellington band captured here was at its peak, featuring Cat Anderson, Cootie Williams, Harry Carney, Paul Gonsalves, Jimmy Hamilton, Johnny Hodges and Russell Procope

Ella Fitzgerald virtually invented the live album. The reason is simple: her performances were so consistently great that almost any live show was special enough to release as a record. In a sense, for Ella Fitzgerald, every night was 'The Moment of Truth'.