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Ella Fitzgerald — When I Get Low (w/ The Chick Webb Orchestra)
Album: Reefer Blues
Avg rating:
7.7

Your rating:
Total ratings: 2193









Released: 1936
Length: 2:23
Plays (last 30 days): 1
My fur coat's sold
Oh Lord ain't it cold
But I'm not gonna holler
'cause I've still got a dollar
And when I get low
Oh, I get high

My man walked out
Now you know that ain't right
He better watch out
If I meet him tonight
I said when I get low
Oh, I get high

All this hard luck in this town has found me
Nobody knows but the troubles are all around me

Oh, I'm all alone
With no one to pet me
My old rocking chair
Ain't never gonna get me
'cause when I get low
Oh, I get high

When I get low
Oh, I get high
Comments (75)add comment
Ella voice is always perfect but sometimes gets the phrasing wrong, missing the meaning of the lyrics.
On this, of course, she soars. Incredible.
Shit hot and what a roll call of talent!!
you mean like right now?

I mean...right now.
The albun title was Reefer Bliues.
 blackieray wrote:

I want hear Metallica do a version of this




LOL!  Too funny!   
I want hear Metallica do a version of this
Shame on those who gave this track less than an 8. You've done Ms. Fitzgerald wrong!
wow...

talk about timing of a song with a current moment of time

celebrate friday night om a thursday night

indeed
The music arrangements reminds me a bit of the infamous band Charlie & His Orchestra.  I can see where they got some of the influence for their music.
 idiot_wind wrote:

You can talk all you want about the greatest vocalist, e.g., Sinatra.

But she has the greatest voice ever in recorded music (but this song doesn't really typify it).



No disrespect to the grear Ella, but honestly ... I think Rhiannon Giddens could give her one heck of a run for the money...
You can talk all you want about the greatest vocalist, e.g., Sinatra.

But she has the greatest voice ever in recorded music (but this song doesn't really typify it).
wow.

thursday nite...

how did RP know

maybe its the "ella factor"
i adore her voice and yet my favorite songs are her odd ones like this and "Cow Cow Boogie" - so much fun and style is great too
 kcar wrote:

Why Ella! I never knew you toked...Her voice sounds so young. 


Ella was 19 when this recording was published!!! She was amazing. 
I put this on my personal playlist. Followed by Low Rider.....
Guess I'll just have to choke down a blunt, followed by an Eskimo Pie!
Most Excellent Ella .....love it......thanks RP, again!
10 10 I get high on meditation now !
Quite relevant for me right now, and quite nice!
Always an easy 9. Wonderful stuff.
Interesting this album was released one year before marijuana prohibition.
Hmmm.......

I don't think my parents were listening to this.
 KaraokeVox wrote:
alcohol works as well and that was banned, too.
 
Alcohol DOESN'T work as well - you should get out more .... a lot more

Re "banning": when will the USA see what the civilized worlds sees - Americans / American culture can't handle guns - keep those thoughts and prayers coming.
Good choice for a rainy Sunday morning drinking coffee in bed while listening to RP.
Waiting til January 1st here in the Prairie State and Land of Lincoln baby!!!

Oh, and why is it that songs like this are sooooo rich, and tooo short!!!
 iloveradio wrote:
Reefer Madness is better than GOP madness🤗
 
sales in Washington state way up since the 2016 election !
 Proclivities wrote:


Pretty standard "jazz" chord progressions in both songs.
 

It's a lot like "Music Goes Round and Round" too
Reefer Madness is better than GOP madness🤗
That Ella is a crazy cat!
 eyeball wrote:
Putting on the ritz!
 

Pretty standard "jazz" chord progressions in both songs.
Canada goes up in smoke on Wednesday!
If I never hear this again I won't mind. Once a year would be enough. 
Love how this song blends into the Dead's Truckin.  I'm at home, but Bill is providing a "driveway moment."  Just thanks.
Just another reason to like Ella!
Putting on the ritz!
Reefer Madness.
Hey...Bill....this little ditty, Ella Fitzgerald's prior "When I get Low, and the Stokes Machu Picchu before that.  Are you on high ground and playing around with your play list?  Are you trying to tell us somethin'?   ;-)

Merry Christmas everyone!  Now where's my egg-nog and Jack Daniels!?

Highlow
American Net'Zen
Wasn't this playing in the background when Han shot Greedo?  (Purely in self-defense, of course.)
Agreed - absolutely wonderful !  
pvg44 wrote:
Ella has one of the best voices ever recorded.

 


Check out the version of this by The Hot Sardines with Alan Cumming https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rPnXCPmrV3Y
 GINRUSH wrote:
Loved seeing Fiona Apple perform this with Nickel Creek. What a treat.

 
Is that the one where she forgets a line and sings "fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!"?

That was a good video. I don't care what anyone else says, I love Fiona Apple!

Love Ella too, this song is the best!
Scandalous!!!!!  It's legal in Oregon!!
 pvg44 wrote:
Ella has one of the best voices ever recorded.

 


Ella has one of the best voices ever recorded.
{#Bananapiano}
Brilliant! 
 oldfart48 wrote:


jimmy not only writes some goodtime tunes, he has written a couple damn good books.

 
Especially if you like sail boats or planes, which I do.
She is was and will ever be: THE GREATEST! 
 :+:_DL wrote:

We're talking about good music, there's no need to bring Jimmy Buffet in here. 

 
Really.  Why even mention that hack?
Last Friday night, I heard this song performed by a local band, arranged for violin, cello, bass violin, acoustic guitar, and bongoes, with the lead singer doing his best Tom Waits imitation.  It actually worked!
Puttin on the Rtiz!
Loved seeing Fiona Apple perform this with Nickel Creek. What a treat.
 oldfart48 wrote:


jimmy not only writes some goodtime tunes, he has written a couple damn good books.

 
A Pirate Looks At Fifty was a great romp!
alcohol works as well and that was banned, too.
Sounds like "Putting on the Ritz" with different words but I still like it...
 oldfart48 wrote:


bullshit. George Washington separated his female hemp plants for smoking and loved indica better than the domestic. pot was leagel until W.R.Hurst discovered hemp paper cost half as much to make as his stolen Mexican wood. you remember his daughter patti. and up until the left coast herbilasts started cross breading and cloning, the best pot in the world grew in Cambodia, laos and tiland., gotta love the black eyes on the cover folks, if you can see a stonners eyes they are usually red.......

 
I didn't say exclusively, I said ALMOST exclusively. I should have been clearer; black folks were mostly the only Americans "smoking" the reefer. And you're right about all these other facts, but it was the race-bating and racist yellow journalism of Hearst that fingered African American's and Mexicans as the primary purveyors of the reefer cigarette and the corrupters of wholesome whites. These newspaper accounts along with Federal Bureau of Narcotics propaganda films helped convince Congress to pass the Marijuana Tax Act of 1937, effectively outlawing the drug.  But as far a it's widespread use before the 30s? Mostly it was distilled into elixirs and sold at pharmacies like other medicines - doctors prescribed it for all manner of remedies. People were using all sorts of narcotics and stimulants for medicinal and recreational purposes during the late 19th and early 20th century and periodically the US and International community would try to regulate their sale and transport. Cannabis extracts were often lumped together with opium and cocaine derivatives.  In fact, the road to making pot illegal was quite a long one before Hearst came along and helped make it happen along with Harry J. Anslinger of the FBN. 
 
 Sasha2001 wrote:

Aside from the Mexican migrant workers who brought the stuff across the border, reefer was imbibed almost exclusively by African Americans before it's prohibition in 1937.

 

bullshit. George Washington separated his female hemp plants for smoking and loved indica better than the domestic. pot was leagel until W.R.Hurst discovered hemp paper cost half as much to make as his stolen Mexican wood. you remember his daughter patti. and up until the left coast herbilasts started cross breading and cloning, the best pot in the world grew in Cambodia, laos and tiland., gotta love the black eyes on the cover folks, if you can see a stonners eyes they are usually red.......
 :+:_DL wrote:

We're talking about good music, there's no need to bring Jimmy Buffet in here. 

 

jimmy not only writes some goodtime tunes, he has written a couple damn good books.
Nice sound quality for such an old recording. A pleasant song to include in the mix. {#Cheesygrin}
yes, yes, yes......can I get a witness....{#Dance}
Don't know about y'all, but I get low when I can't get high. {#Devil_pimp}
You're right, Bill!  The title gives a very good idea what its about.  {#Cowboy}
Thank you for this.
This used to be the theme song in my trailer park!

awesome...  love it...
 
 JHZ wrote:

"Then it's bandstand, disneyland, growin up fast
Drinkin on a fake i.d.
Yeah, and rama of the jungle was everyones bawana
But only jazz musicians were smokin marijuana
Yeah, I wish I had a pencil thin mustache
Then I could solve some mysteries too"
Jimmy Buffett (Pencil Thin Mustache) apparently knew that Jazz musicans liked that particular kind of smoke.
 
We're talking about good music, there's no need to bring Jimmy Buffet in here. 
How nice to hear her when she was young; makes me think of Caro Emerald's (likely imitated but why not copy the best?) stylings, too... I'm not surprised the musicians of even that era were fond of smoking the herb...of course, the music world was hip to it!
 kcar wrote:
Why Ella! I never knew you toked...Her voice sounds so young. 
 
Aside from the Mexican migrant workers who brought the stuff across the border, reefer was imbibed almost exclusively by African Americans before it's prohibition in 1937.
 kcar wrote:
Why Ella! I never knew you toked...Her voice sounds so young. 
 
"Then it's bandstand, disneyland, growin up fast
Drinkin on a fake i.d.
Yeah, and rama of the jungle was everyones bawana
But only jazz musicians were smokin marijuana
Yeah, I wish I had a pencil thin mustache
Then I could solve some mysteries too"
Jimmy Buffett (Pencil Thin Mustache) apparently knew that Jazz musicans liked that particular kind of smoke.
This.  This is why I support this station.

That was completely refreshing. 
'When I get low.... I get high'  

Go girl!!
Why Ella! I never knew you toked...Her voice sounds so young.