Life of the "Divine One," by the author of the well-received Nat
King Cole bio Unforgettable (1991). Gourse has a lively subject in
Vaughan (1924-90), whose voice was a soaring and dipping bebop
instrument that charmed most listeners but also bored or offended a
few with its slow and seemingly overinvolved delivery. Musicians
adored playing with Vaughan, although her later repertoire - with
its saccharine Percy Faith strings, Beatles tunes, and pop
sentiments - saddened purists. Vaughan doesn't provide Course with
as dramatic a personal history as did Cole. Choir-singing Vaughan
showed early talent in Newark, with an ear for copying with voice
and piano anything she heard on radio. She skipped school or
climbed out the bedroom window to hear musicians at clubs or in
theaters. Despite adulation by Billy Eckstine, Earl Hines, and
others who hired her, she was gap-toothed, rail-thin, and shy until
her first husband, trumpeter George Treadwell, revamped her, had
her teeth capped, and became her manager. With a phenomenal ear for
chords, Vaughan always felt she'd learned most from her work with
Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie, though she long thought her
best recordings were with trumpeter Clifford Brown. Later, she took
up concertizing and even worked with symphony conductor Michael
Tilson Thomas. Life with her husband dissolved into fighting, with
Treadwell overbearing, abusive, and jealous - though he could be
charming and generous as well. Eventually, Vaughan had five, often
jealous, husbands and won and lost several fortunes. She died of
lung cancer and was mourned by musicians everywhere. Says Course:
"In her twenties and thirties, her voice had been as light and
brilliant as fine wine; by her sixties it was as robust as cognac."
Too much shifting bandstand personnel to keep steady interest.
(Kirkus Reviews)
Sarah Vaughan possessed the most spectacular voice in jazz history.
In Sassy , Leslie Gourse, the acclaimed biographer of Nat King Cole
and Joe Williams, defines and celebrates Vaughan's vital musical
legacy and offers a detailed portrait of the woman as well as the
singer. Revealed here is "The Divine One" as only her closest
friends and musical associates knew her. By her early twenties
Sarah Vaughan was singining with Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker,
and Billy Eckstine, helping them invent bebop. For forty-five years
thereafter, she reigned supreme in both pop and jazz, with several
million-selling hits (among them "Broken Hearted Melody," "Make
Yourself Comfortable," and "Misty").But life offstage was never
smooth for Sarah Vaughan. Her voluptuous voice was matched by her
exuberant appetite for excess: three failed marriages, financial
difficulties through many changes in management, late-night jam
sessions, liquor, and cocaine. In Sassy , though, we also see the
feisty and unpretentious woman who worked hard all her life to
support her parents and adopted daughter, and who came to savour
the hard-won independence and worldwide acclaim she achieved as the
greatest jazz singer of her generation.
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