The flawless voice and delivery of singer Ella Fitzgerald is woven tightly into the tapestry of American popular music. Her place in the canon of jazz artists was ensured early on in her career, while she reached a wider audience throughout the world with her renditions of those enduring songs that have come to be known as standards. Her name is almost synonymous with the compositions of Irving Berlin, George Gershwin, Rodgers and Hart, and Cole Porter, as well as the music of Duke Ellington. Her interpretation of their music is forever enshrined in her famous "Song Book" series of albums, in which she uniquely included the verses to the songs. Billed as "The First Lady of Song," she commanded sell-out attendance at her concerts at home and abroad, touring extensively from the mid-1940s onwards, but her unique integrity to the music and...