There is a certain fearlessness that is required for scat singing. It's more than technique or ability; it's willingness to cast about, to improvise, to start a line without always being sure exactly where it'll end.
Or maybe not. Maybe musical geniuses like Ella Fitzgerald had some kind of chord progression map in their brains, guiding the assortment of notes toward an inevitable and resolved conclusion.
All I know is that scat singing is really, really difficult. It's especially difficult to do well. And this -- this is scat singing done unbelievably, extraordinarily, inhumanly well.
I apologize for the lack of actual live video. I have no idea when this was recorded -- Ella Fitzgerald was actively performing for more than 60 years, starting in the 1930's -- but I'm sure she looked fabulous. Maybe you can muster the enthusiasm for trains that drove my little brother to learn to use YouTube when he was two years old so he could look up Thomas the Tank Engine videos.
This generation is so weird.
Thanks to my grandpa for sending me this video!
This girl is captivating. She's only 17 years old and she sings like she's been listening to Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, Etta James, and Louis Armstrong since the womb. Her affectation and ornamentation are just perfect. Her voice is simply beyond her years. For all my love for Norah Jones and her queenship over modern jazz, Nikki is perched on the edge of her seat, ready to take over as soon as the mainstream U.S. music audience notices her.
Nikki's career began at age 12, when she sang in the Montreal International Jazz Festival -- the youngest headliner ever. She's Canadian, so she sang at the opening and closing ceremonies of the 2010 Vancouver Olympics. Two albums released (2008 and 2010), but so far she's getting way less attention in the States than in ol' Canada. I guess the music scene up there is slightly more jazz and talent than gangsta rap and Rebecca Black.
Speaking of Rebecca Black, if she's the sort of young artist the U.S. is producing, and Nikki is what Canada is producing...well, damn it all to hell, I need to learn French and move up-continent.
It's fun to find these in-studio recordings too; they feel so up-close and personal. The song itself was written in 1952 in reference to Charlie "Bird" Parker, and it charted in 1954 thanks to Ella Fitzgerald. Enjoy.
