Another unusual, unique entry in Ella Fitzgerald's extensive recording career, this is likely the sexiest version of "Just a Closer Walk" you'll ever hear, but before we get into that, a bit of history.

1967 marked the end of Ella's peak period as both a recording artist and a vocalist as she entered her fifties and departed from the Verve record label, where she'd spent more than two decades scoring triumph after triumph on vinyl. Her celebrated voice had begun to show small signs of wear, and over the next eight years, she would hop from label to label, recording nine largely lackluster albums for five different houses.

"My fur coat's sold,
Oh, Lord, ain't it cold
But I'm not gonna holler
Cuz i still got a dollar,
And when I get low..."

So let's reach way back and talk about this weird anomaly from early in Ella Fitzgerald's singing career. Ella made her name singing in drummer Chick Webb's big band before striking out on her own in the late '40s.

On April 7, 1936, the band recorded this strikingly jaunty ditty about a female drunk or junkie--it's hard to tell for sure, because back then, "high" was also a synonym for "drunk." (See the lyrics from Bessie Smith's 1928 "Me and My Gin," also covered by Dinah Washington 30 years later, for a clear example of this.)

My favorite Ella Fitzgerald recording, a spectacular track recorded March 18, 1958 for The Irving Berlin Songbook, then--amazingly--cut from the record! This didn't see daylight till the following year's Get Happy.

Here, conductor Paul Weston drops Ella in front of a big band filled out with a number of her regular studio backers (including frequent collaborator Harry "Sweets" Edison on solo trumpet) and provides a jazzy, wide-open arrangement as a vehicle for perhaps the greatest scat solo she ever laid down in a studio setting, a dazzling flight over two and a half full choruses.

A sizzling take on a major standard, with a knockout big band arrangement by Bill Doggett. That horn sound is MASSIVE. And no wonder - the band included folks like Ernie Royal, Melba Liston, Kai Winding, Les Taylor, and Phil Woods. Hank Jones on piano, Lucille Dixon on bass, Gus Johnson on drums, Mundell Lowe on guitar. Hell of a band.

Ella's having a blast here playing with multiple dynamics, getting to do torch ballad and blistering swing all in a matter of minutes, even throwing in a little scat. Recorded in January 1962 as the closing track for that year's Rhythm is My Business, it nicely capsulizes all of what she did best.

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A fun track from 1963's Ella Sings Broadway, this fluffy little number from The Pajama Game is juiced up with a smoky, vamping, almost bebop-style Marty Paich arrangement that lets Ella play around a little. A good example of how she could take a song that had no business being taken seriously on a vocal jazz record, and make it somehow work.