Chords for Ella Fitzgerald's Signature Singing Style, Explained By Jazzmeia Horn

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Greetings, I'm Jazmia Horn, and I'm here to talk about Ella [B] Fitzgerald [A] and the legacy
of scat singing and improvisation.
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[F#] Nothing but blue [A#] skies [F#] from now [G] on.
[A#] _ [F] Ella Fitzgerald is one of the most important [G] jazz singers or singers in jazz [N] music.
And she's important because she's known for her improvisational skills and her storytelling.
And she's also called the lady of song.
She was very _ childlike and fun and playful in what she did.
And she made her own and created her own legacy.
There were no other singers on the scene in 1934, 35, 36, doing what she was doing.
And one of the things that I took from Ella Fitzgerald was some of her phrasing _ and a
little bit of her vocabulary.
And what that does is help to build your own vocabulary.
There is one song in particular that she really made famous, which is entitled Blue Skies.
And one of the phrases that she sang during her scat solo sounded like this. _ _ _ _ _
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And what I did was listen to that and try to listen to her phrasing and her sound and
why she chose to sing certain syllables and put emphasis on which downbeat and which phrase.
Do, dee, ba, doo, do, dee, ba, doo, do.
_ That is something that is hard to explain.
But if you sit down and you listen,
and listen, and listen, and listen,
and get it into your soul, and get it into your belly,
eventually _ you'll be able to improvise over chord changes
and start to understand structure, and form,
and phrasing, and diction.
I'm particularly inspired by Ella Fitzgerald
because of her sound and the quality of her sound
and the way she expressed herself
when she was scat singing.
It's very fun, and interesting, and inspiring.
But we don't have the same style at all.
_ I'm here in 2019 as a scat singer
or as an improvisational musician,
expressing myself in a different way,
as the times are different.
But the music is somewhat still the same.
And I like to say that I am continuing
the legacy or the tradition of vocal improvisation.
And now I'm gonna show you exactly what I mean
by sharing with you a little bit of my way of improvising.
And in the studio today, I have my friend, Barry Stevenson,
who is also gonna join me on the bass.
_ And we're gonna play Blue Skies.
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_ [A#] _ [C#] Day [Gm] all of [G] God, nothing but blue skies.
♪
♪ From now on.
♪ Shut up. _ _ _ _ _ _
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