Ella Fitzgerald

Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater Celebrates Mother's Day Weekend

By Doug Doyle • May 10, 2018

Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater is on a coast-to-coast North American Tour that will culminate May 11-13 at NJPAC with three special programs.

Artistic Director Robert Battle came into the WBGO studios to talk about the three-day program.

Performances include the opening Ailey Jazz program presenting the NJPAC debut of Ailey star Jamar Roberts’ Members Don’t Get Weary - his first world premiere for the Company, which he joined in 2002.

Take Five: Unmissable New Music From Edward Simon, Erik Friedlander, Rafiq Bhatia and More

By Nate Chinen • Apr 15, 2018

After Six Decades in the Vault, 'Ella at Zardi's' Brings New Shine to Ella Fitzgerald's Centennial

By Nate Chinen • Nov 9, 2017

Ella Fitzgerald was a big star on the cusp of something bigger when she began an engagement at Zardi’s Jazzland, in the heart of Hollywood, during the first several weeks of 1956.

Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and Jazz: Perfect Together

By Doug Doyle • May 8, 2017

Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater will be completing a coast-to-coast tour at NJPAC for performances on Mother’s Day weekend.

It is especially significant that the Company will be performing 3 works (on Friday evening and Sunday matinee) that celebrates the marriage of modern dance and jazz.

A company premiere and a new production that pay homage to two jazz legends on their birth centennials; Artistic Director Robert Battle’s Ella to the scatting of Ella Fitzgerald and Billy Wilson’s The Winter in Lisbon tribute to Dizzy Gillespie.

Swinging Into Ella Fitzgerald's Centennial, with Six Tracks Hand-Picked by Our Announcers

By Nate Chinen • Apr 24, 2017

William P. Gottlieb / Library of Congress

The immortal Ella Fitzgerald, First Lady of Song, was born a century ago — April 25, 1917 — and there has been no shortage of commemorative celebration. We caught the spirit and asked some of our on-air hosts at WBGO to curate this edition of Take Five. Their enthusiasm compelled us to expand the column to six tracks, spanning the golden era of her roughly five-decade recording career.

Few Really Knew Ella Fitzgerald

By Ang Santos & Ishmael Martinez • Mar 30, 2017

You wouldn’t think a singer who was doing close to 300 shows a year at their peak would be nervous each time the curtains rose. Archivist Tad Hershorn with The Institute of Jazz Studies at Rutgers-Newark says that was the case for Ella Fitzgerald.

“She was always nervous before she went on stage as we are about any type of life experience we might even have a certain handle on. But when that music started, there she was, it was like watching your grandmother turn into Superwoman,” Hershorn said.

Take Five: Miles Okazaki's Trickster, Trio 3, Ella Fitzgerald, Joe Fiedler, John Raymond

By Nate Chinen • Mar 20, 2017

A basket. A box. A notebook. A bumper. Every track in this week's Take Five has a title that evokes some material object, for reasons both comic and constructive. Beyond that commonality, there's a staggering range here, with one recording that's almost 80 years old and one or two others that sound like the near future.

Schomburg Center Celebrates Ella Fitzgerald

By Ang Santos • Mar 14, 2017

Ella, Ella: A Centennial Celebration of Mama Jazz the latest installment of the Schomburg Center’s annual Women’s Month events. Novella Ford is the manager of public programs at Schomburg. She says it’s all about making sure that people leave informed.

Hearing "Stella," and Seeing Past the Snow

By Nate Chinen • Mar 13, 2017

For tens of millions in the Northeast, the name of the hour is “Stella” — as in Winter Storm Stella, the Weather Channel-branded nor'easter now bringing heavy snowfall to a number of cities along the I-95 corridor. I’m among those presently hunkering down (and later, shoveling out), but my first involuntary response was to start humming a familiar melody.

The Women's Jazz Festival, at Harlem's Schomburg Center, Fêtes Ella Fitzgerald

By Nate Chinen • Mar 8, 2017

Today, March 8, is International Women’s Day. In the spirit of the occasion, it’s worth spotlighting the Women's Jazz Festival at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem, which runs through the end of the month.

The kickoff event in the series, which took place on Monday night, was organized and anchored by harpist Brandee Younger, a leading voice on her instrument.