Okay, let's jump right in. Welcome back to the
Deep Dive. Today we are looking at a stack of
notes, articles, and I mean whole history about
a figure who is, well, she's just monumental.
Truly. It's hard to find the right word sometimes.
It is. And I want to start with a quote that
I think, well, honestly, it shocked me when I
first read it. It's from Frank Sinatra. Oh, I
think I know the one you're talking about. It
is. Visceral is the word. It's so intense. So
Sinatra is talking about the subject of our deep
dive today. And he says, quote, Sassy is so good
now that when I listen to her, I want to cut
my wrists with a dull razor. And you have to
understand that's a compliment, a massive one
coming from him. A very dark, very dramatic compliment.
But it tells you everything, right? It tells
you something about the power of the woman we
are talking about today. Sarah Vaughan. Also
known as Sassy. Also known as the Divine One.
The Divine One. And arguably the possessor of,
I mean, what some people call the single greatest
voice in the history of American music. That
is a huge claim, but it's one I think the evidence
really supports. Is it, though? I mean, the greatest.
That's a high bar. It is. But when you look at
the source material we have today, biographies,
critical essays from people like Gary Giddens,
just the sheer timeline of her career, it's a
claim that really holds up. I mean, the critic
Scott Yanow, he called her as one of the most
wondrous voices of the 20th century. But the
tragedy or maybe the central tension of her life
was that the world didn't always know what to
do. with a voice that big right and that's what
i kept seeing in the research she's constantly
getting pulled in these different directions
is she a pop star is she a jazz improviser she's
an opera singer who just took a wrong turn somewhere
exactly so our mission today i think is to figure
out how a girl from newark new jersey ended up
with that kind of reputation we're going to look
at how she navigated this incredible almost constant
tension between being a high art musician and
i mean high art and a commercial pop star Because
reading through this, it seems like she was constantly
being pulled in two directions at once. And that's
because she wasn't just a singer. I think that's
the first thing we really need to get straight
in our heads. She was a musician who happened
to use her voice as her primary instrument. Like
a horn player. Precisely. Yeah. And she stood
right at this perfect intersection in time where
the birth of bebop met the absolute height of
pop music. She had a foot in both worlds. And
she collected the hardware to prove it. I mean,
two Grammys, but she was nominated for nine,
an NEA Jazz Masters Award. Beyond the awards,
it's the story of the voice itself that's just,
it's mind blowing. It really is. So let's dive
right into that. Section one, the instrument.
Because we have to understand what we're actually
working with here before we can understand the
career. Let's do it. So where do you want to
start with the voice? The range. The range has
to be it. When people talk about Sarah Vaughan,
they don't just talk about singing. They talk
about this. This insane range. We're talking
about four octaves. Which is incredibly rare.
I mean, for a jazz or pop singer, it's almost
unheard of. And we need to really visualize what
four octaves mean. Right. It's not just a number.
No. Most pop songs, you know, the ones you hear
on the radio, they sit in a very comfortable
one and a half octave pocket. Maybe two, if the
singer's feeling ambitious. Sure. Sarah. She
was building a skyscraper while everyone else
was building single -story ranch houses. She
can move from a soprano high C all the way down
to a female baritone. And notice I said baritone,
not just alto or contralto. That's low. That's
like cello low. I can't even fathom making that
sound. It's very, very low. In her later years,
critics described that lower register as a burnished
contralto. Burnished. I like that word. It sounds
warm and rich. Exactly. One critic from the New
York Times wrote that hearing her use that lower
register was like... dipping into a deep, mysterious
well to scoop up a trove of buried riches. I
love that image. It's not just about hitting
a low note. It's about finding something down
there. It implies there's a texture and a weight
to it, not just a pitch. Precisely. There's character
in the note. And then in the very same song,
maybe even the next phrase, she could just flip
to the upper register and deliver these incredibly
delicate and ringingly high coloratura passages.
Okay, so coloratura, that's an opera term, right?
What does that actually mean? It basically means
highly ornamented, florid singing. Think of fast
runs, trills, a lot of notes packed into a short
space. It's vocal gymnastics, essentially. And
she could just do that without formal training
for it. It seems so. It wasn't just that she
could hit the notes. It was the texture. It was
described by one source as thick as cognac, but
capable of soaring like a violin. How can something
be both of those things at once? That's the mystery
of it. And you mentioned opera, which comes up
a lot in the research. There's this constant
comparison to opera singers. There is. And it
wasn't just critics making the comparison. Betty
Carter, another legendary jazz singer who knew
a thing or two about vocals, she actually noted
that with training, Sarah Vaughan could have
gone as far as Leontine Price. Leontine Price,
the opera legend. That's peer review at the absolute
highest level. It is. It's like a great novelist
saying another writer could have been Tolstoy.
So the obvious question is, why didn't she? Why
didn't we get Sarah Vaughan at the Met? If she
had the pipes for it, why do we find her in smoky
jazz clubs instead of opera houses? That is a
fascinating question, and it gets to the core
of who she was as an artist. Bob James, who was
her musical director for a while in the 60s,
had a really interesting take on this. What did
he say? He said the legitimacy of that whole
world, the opera world, it just wasn't for her.
It wasn't her vibe. It was too rigid. To structured?
You sing what's on the page exactly as it's written.
Exactly as it's written, every single time. She
wanted to mess with the notes. You can't improvise
in Puccini. If you change the notes in the aria,
you get fired. In jazz, if you change the notes
in a creative way, you're a genius. So she chose
freedom over structure. She had the instrument,
but she wanted to use it differently. She wanted
to color outside the lines. Right. It's about
the application of the instrument. It's the difference
between being a world -class architect who builds
from a blueprint and a world -class sculptor
who finds the form in the marble as they go.
I like that. And this brings us to her technique,
which some critics actually kind of weirdly referred
to as her schtick. Yeah, schtick. Sounds a bit
dismissive, doesn't it? Like she's doing a magic
trick or something that cheapens the art. It
does. It sounds like a comedy routine. But in
her case, it was about her unique mannerisms
that became her signature, things nobody else
could do. For example, she had this ability to
fray or bend notes at the very extremities of
her range. What does fray a note mean? It's like
she'd hit the note perfectly and then just at
the end let it get a little rough around the
edges, give it this human, imperfect quality.
She'd also slide into a note, scoop up to it,
color it, vibrate it. Her vibrato was just a
world unto itself. The vibrato, right. It wasn't
that polite little shimmer. No. It was described
as voluptuous and heavy. It wasn't that... perfect
metronomic vibrato you learn in a conservatory.
It was alive. It was visceral. It had its own
personality. And she had this very specific way
of working the microphone, right? I've seen footage
of her holding the mic way out at arm's length.
It looks really dramatic, almost like she's pushing
the song away from her. That wasn't just for
show, though. That was a tool. That was physical
volume control. Ah, okay. She used the microphone
as part of the instrument. Her voice had such
a huge dynamic range, from a whisper to a roar,
that the sound equipment of the era just couldn't
handle it. The sound engineers couldn't ride
the faders fast enough. So she just did it herself.
She became her own mixer. By moving the microphone
physically closer for intimacy, further away
for power, she could alter the texture and the
volume in real time. It was a very conscious
technical performance style. It's like a guitarist
using a wah -wah pedal or a volume pedal, but
she's doing it with space and air. That's a great
analogy. That's exactly what it was. All of this,
the range, the texture, the technique, it led
the critic Gary Giddens to call her the ageless
voice of modern jazz, of giddy post -war virtuosity,
biting wit, and fearless caprice. Fearless caprice.
I like that. It sounds like she was having fun
with her own talent. Like, she knew she was driving
a Ferrari, and sometimes she just wanted to see
what it could do on the curves. She absolutely
was. You can hear the joy of discovery in her
improvisations. She knew exactly what she could
do, and she knew she could do things no one else
could. Okay, so we have this. This four -octave
wonder. This vocal Ferrari. But she didn't just
appear out of nowhere fully formed. Let's rewind.
We have to go back to the origin story. Section
2. Newark, New Jersey, 1924. A very humble beginning.
Her father, Edward Jake Vaughan, was a carpenter.
Her mother, Ada, was a laundress. But there was
music in the house. Oh, absolutely. Her dad played
guitar and piano by ear. Her mom sang in the
church choir, so the raw material was there.
The musical DNA was present from day one. And
religion was in the house. The church was central.
Very much so. The Mount Zion Baptist Church in
Newark. That's really where it all started for
her. Sarah began piano lessons at the age of
seven. She sang in the choir, but crucially,
she also played piano for rehearsals and for
services. And I feel like the piano part is something
people forget. They think of her standing in
front of a band, but she was a player first.
She was a musician before she was the singer.
And that is the absolute key to understanding
her later style. She understood harmony from
the keys up. She knew why the notes worked together.
She wasn't just a singer relying on her air to
find a pretty melody. She was a musician who
understood the math behind the music, the architecture
of the chords. Which let her break the rules
later, because she knew what the rules were.
You have to know the rules to break them effectively.
But, you know, like many great pastors, daughters,
and church organists, there was a rebel element.
Oh, do tell. Well, by the time she was in her
mid -teens, she was venturing out, illegally,
into Newark nightclubs. We're talking about places
like the Piccadilly Club, the Newark Airport.
She was sneaking out of the house to perform.
As a singer. As a pianist and a singer. Getting
a feel for a different kind of music, a different
kind of audience. So she's mixing the sacred
and the profane before she was even out of high
school. Exactly. Playing hymns in the morning
and jazz standards at night. And that duality,
that tension, it defined her whole life. And
it leads us directly to the moment that changed
everything. The Apollo Theater, 1942. Now this
is a legendary story, but the details in our
source material are actually really specific
and kind of funny. She didn't go there to become
a star, did she? No. Not at all. That's the best
part of the story. She went there to play piano.
She had a friend named Doris Robinson. Sarah
thought Doris had a great voice and should enter
the famous amateur night contest. So Sarah just
went along to be the accompanist. So she's the
sidekick. She's in the background, literally
sitting behind her friend. She's the sidekick.
Doris Robinson gets up, sings her song, and wins
second prize. Not bad at all. Not bad for amateur
night at the Apollo. But then, a week later,
Vaughn decides, you know what? I'm going to go
back and try this myself. I can take these people.
She had the confidence. And she didn't play piano
this time. No. She went back as a singer. She
got up on that legendary stage and she sang Body
and Soul. Wow. That is not an easy song to sing.
That is a terrifying song to sing for an amateur
contest. The chord changes are so complex. Incredibly
complex. And she won. She blew them away. And
the prize, wait for it, was... $10. $10, that's
it. $10 and a promise of a week's engagement
opening for Ella Fitzgerald. Okay, the $10 is
insulting, but the week opening for Ella? That's
the real prize. Talk about a return on investment.
$10 and a career. It's incredible. And that week
at the Apollo is where the next chapter begins.
Because in the audience, or backstage, depending
on which source you believe, were the people
who would shape the entire future of jazz. And
this moves us perfectly into Section 3, the incubator
of bebop. Because she didn't just join any old
big band. She fell into the most important, most
revolutionary band of the entire era. The Earl
Hines Band. Now, there are conflicting stories
about exactly how she got hired. Earl Hines himself
claimed he discovered her. But Billy Eckstein,
who was the star singer for Hines at the time,
says he was the one who heard her and told Hines,
you have to hear this girl. So a little bit of
a turf war over who gets the credit. A little
bit. But however it happened, she gets the gig.
But there was a catch, right? There was a union
issue. Yes, and this is a great detail that shows
you the business side of things. It's what one
of our sources calls the Trojan horse hiring.
Okay, explain that. So you had different unions.
The Musicians Union had jurisdiction over instrumentalists,
but the American Federation of Radio Artists,
AFRA, had jurisdiction over vocalists. There
was a strike or a quota issue. It's complicated
1940s labor politics, but the bottom line was
Hines couldn't hire another singer. His singer
slot was filled by Billy Eckstein. Right, so
what did he do? He was clever. Earl Hines hired
Sarah Vaughn as a pianist. Ah, so he could bring
her in under his existing musician contracts
and just wink, wink, let her sing. Exactly. So
she's technically the second pianist. She comes
in on the piano bench, but everyone knows she's
really there to sing. But the most important
part of this is thinking about who else was in
that band. Who are we talking about here? This
is the crucial part. We are talking about the
absolute incubator of bebop. Dizzy Gillespie
was on trumpet. Charlie Parker was on... saxophone
playing tenor, actually not his usual alto, which
is a whole other story. This band was ground
zero for the revolution in jazz. Wait, hold on.
So in the same room, on the same bus, every single
night, you have Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Bird
Parker. Yes. And Sarah Vaughn is sitting there,
maybe 10 feet away, listening to them reinvent
music, listening to Charlie Parker deconstruct
melodies and play a thousand notes a minute.
So she's basically going to grad school for bebop
while she's on the road. That explains so much.
Her phrasing, her timing. If you're listening
to Charlie Parker play saxophone every night,
you're hearing someone treat a melody like it's
made of rubber. She's living it. She's breathing
it in. And then when Billy Eckstein decides to
leave and form his own band, which was even more
modern. Sarah follows him. And that band was
even more stacked, if that's possible. It is
possible. The Billy Eckstine Orchestra included,
at various times, Miles Davis and Art Blakey.
That is an insane lineup. That's like the 1992
dream team of jazz. It's not a band. It's a collection
of future legends. It is. And this is why Sarah
Vaughan sounded different from all the singers
who came before her. She was completely immersed
in the complice harmonies of these instrumentalists.
She learned to use her ear like a horn player.
So she wasn't just thinking about the words.
Not at all. She was thinking about the chord
changes. She was navigating the harmony just
like Charlie Parker would on his sax. Most singers
breathe in a certain way. They hold notes for
the lyrics to make story clear. Sarah would break
a word in half if it meant hitting the right
syncopation, the right rhythmic accent, the way
a trumpet would. So when we say she used her
voice like an instrument, it's not just some
poetic metaphor. It's literally because she was
trained by the greatest instrumentalists of her
generation. She was one of the guys. Precisely.
And this is also where she got the name. Sassy.
Yes. The pianist in the band, John Malachi, gave
her the moniker Sassy because, well, it matched
her personality. She was young. She was confident,
maybe a little fresh, a little bit of a smart
aleck on the tour bus. She could hang with the
boys. She could. And she liked the name. She
even spelled it sassy in letters sometimes. But
sassy is the one that stuck. So she has the name.
She has the skills. She has the credibility that
money can't buy. But now she has to make a living
as a solo artist. And this brings us to the real
struggle, section four, the commercial struggle.
And this is the defining tension of her entire
career, pop versus jazz. Art versus commerce.
Bebop is high art. It's musically intellectual.
It's often frantic and complex. Does it sell
records to housewives in the Midwest in 1948?
I'm going to go with a hard no on that one. No.
And Sarah Vaughan needed to make a living. So
she launches her solo career in the mid -40s.
and she gets an early hit with a song called
Tenderly. Tenderly was a huge moment for her.
She was actually really proud to be the first
one to record that song, which became a massive
jazz standard. It was an unexpected pop hit for
her in 1947. Ah, beautiful ballad. And then she
had another hit with Nature Boy. Right. But Nature
Boy had that weird production story, didn't it?
Something about a strike. It did. There was a
musicians union recording band at the time, basically
a strike against the record labels. So instruments
couldn't be legally recorded for a period. So
how do you make a record with no instruments?
You recorded a capella with a choir. That's a
flex. I don't need a band. I'll just use a bunch
of other voices as my orchestra. And it worked.
It was a hit. But this success. This ability
to cross over, it attracted the big labels. And
that's where things got really complicated. In
the 1950s, she ends up with a very unique and
some would say schizophrenic contract arrangement
with Mercury Records. Tell me about this strategy,
because it sounds like they're trying to split
her personality right down the middle. They literally
were. Her manager at the time, her first husband,
George Treadwell, he negotiated this deal. The
idea was she would record the commercial. string
-laden, pop -oriented material for the main Mercury
label. That was for the radio. And the other
stuff, the jazz. She would record the real jazz
stuff, the stuff she actually loved, with small
groups, for Mercury's subsidiary label, Emmercy.
It was their dedicated jazz imprint. So Mercury
for the money, Emmercy for the soul. That's the
simplified version, yes. And in theory, it's
brilliant. It allowed her artistic freedom on
one side, but it also contractually forced her
to record songs she absolutely detested on the
other. It's like an actor doing Shakespeare by
day and soap operas by night. And we have a prime
example of a song she hated, right? A song that
just made her skin crawl. Oh, yes. Broken -hearted
melody. Groans. I listened to it before we started
recording today. It's catchy, I'll give it that,
but it is incredibly cheesy. It sounds like a
nursery rhyme with a backbeat. It is the definition
of cheesy. It's pop fluff of the highest order.
Sarah Vaughan called it corny. She did not want
to record it. She fought the label on it. But
they made her. And guess what? It was the biggest
hit of her career. Her first gold record. It
was her biggest commercial peak, released in
1959. And the ultimate irony is, because it was
such a massive hit, she had to keep singing it
in concerts for years and years. That must be
actual torture. Being the divine one, this incredible
musician capable of improvising on the level
of Charlie Parker and having to go out and sing
this corny pop song every single night because
that's what the audience paid to hear. It's the
price of fame. It's the definition of golden
handcuffs. And later, when she moved to Columbia
Records, they steered her almost exclusively
toward commercial ballads. There's a real sense
in the source material that she was constantly
fighting to maintain her artistic integrity against
the industry's relentless need for radio hits.
You mentioned George Treadwell, her manager and
husband, and that segues us perfectly and somewhat
tragically into Section 5, love, management,
and money. This is the pattern that emerges when
you look at her life offstage, and it's just
heartbreaking. She had this recurring tendency
to marry men who would then take over her management.
The classic manager -husband syndrome, mixing
business and pleasure. And in her case, almost
always with disastrous financial results. Let's
start with husband number one. George Treadwell.
He was the trumpeter. He was the one who managed
that Mercury -Emercy deal, so he was smart about
some things. He was a sharp operator, for sure.
He really managed her image. He managed her career
from 1946 to 1958. He had her teeth capped to
close a gap she was self -conscious about. He
got her a new wardrobe, taught her how to carry
herself on stage. He polished the image of the
Divine One. He built the Sarah Vaughan brand.
He built the car, but he also kept the keys and
the title. He absolutely did. But he also managed
all money. When they finally divorced in 1958,
after a decade of her being a legitimate superstar,
years of constant touring, hit records, gold
records, Treadwell claimed that only $16 ,000
remained. $16 ,000? After 10 years of being a
household name, where did it all go? That's what
he claimed. They split it. She was left with
$8 ,000. That is, I don't even have a word for
it. It's just outright theft. It certainly feels
that way. But you'd think she would learn a lesson
from that, right? Don't mix your love life with
your finances. You would think. But she didn't.
Enter husband number two, Clyde C .B. Atkins.
The source material describes him as a man of
uncertain background, which is polite historian
speak for he was a shady character. Very shady.
She met him in Chicago. He had absolutely no
experience in music management, no connections,
nothing. But she fell for him and she put him
in charge anyway. She seemed to want that husband
-manager dynamic again. And how did that one
go? Worse. Much, much worse. For starters, the
relationship was reportedly violent. And financially.
He was a gambler. A heavy gambler. He spent wildly.
When they finally split up, he had put her $150
,000 in debt. $150 ,000 in the early 60s? That's
an astronomical amount of money. It is. And it
gets worse. She lost her house. The IRS seized
her home in Inglewood Cliffs, New Jersey because
the taxes hadn't been paid for years. She was
even broke. She had to work her way back from
absolute zero. Imagine being Sarah Vaughan, the
Divine One, a global star, and you're basically
homeless and broke because your husband gambled
away every penny you ever earned. It's just devastating.
You have this God -given talent. You're working
constantly. And the people who are supposed to
be protecting you are the ones draining you dry.
It's amazing she kept performing. I think a lot
of people would have just quit. She couldn't
quit. She had to perform to pay off the debts.
But there is a silver lining in the 1970s. Not
a husband this time, but a lover and manager
named Marshall Fisher. And where did she find
him? He wasn't another musician, was he? No.
She found him at a concession stand in Las Vegas.
He was a fan who worked there. Wait, a concession
stand employee? Yes. And unlike the polished,
slick businessman who came before him, Fisher
was just genuinely devoted to her. He moved in
with her. He treated her with kindness and respect.
And he started managing her career meticulously.
Did he have any experience? Zero. Absolutely
zero music business experience. But he cared
about her. And it turns out that was the most
important qualification. He stabilized things
for her. That's a nice change of pace. Shout
out to Marshall, the concession stand guy. Sometimes
you just need a normal person who actually appreciates
you. Exactly. I should say, eventually she did
marry a third time to a trumpeter named Wayman
Reed, who was 16 years her junior. But Fisher
was the one who really righted the ship during
a crucial transition period for her career. And
that transition leads us right into section six,
the Renaissance. Because after that rough patch
in the 60s where jazz in general was struggling
against the rise of rock and roll, she comes
back swinging in the 70s. She returns to recording
after a bit of a hiatus. She signs with a label
called Mainstream Records. And again, there's
this attempt to pivot to a more contemporary
pop sound. She's covering Bob Dylan, John Lennon,
Marvin Gaye. Which brings us to the clown story,
Send in the Clowns. Ah, yes. The song that would
become her signature for the rest of her life.
Yeah. But the album it was on caused a huge,
huge controversy. Why? What was the problem?
The cover art. Sarah Vaughan absolutely hated
it. It depicted a clown with an afro. Oh, no.
That sounds terrible. Yeah. It was the 70s. But
even for the 70s, it was a bad choice. She felt
it was undignified. It looked like a caricature.
She had worked so hard to build this image of
elegance and sophistication. And the label puts
a cartoon on the cover. What did she do? She
actually sued the label owner, Bob Shad, over
it. She sued him over the album art. She did.
She was furious. But the song itself. The song
she kept. She loved the song. It's a Stephen
Sondheim song from the musical A Little Night
Music. She learned it on the piano, again, remember
she's a pianist first, and she altered the harmonies,
changed the phrasing, and basically rewrote it
to fit her style. It became her new masterpiece.
So she hates the album cover, sues the guy who
owns the label, but keeps the song and makes
it legendary. That is a power move. She takes
this Broadway ballad and she just deconstructs
it. She hits notes that are nowhere on the sheet
music. She makes it sound like she wrote it at
3 a .m. in a smoky jazz club. Absolutely. And
this era. also ushered in what we can call her
symphony years. This is where the high art side
of her personality really takes over and gets
the recognition it deserves. She started working
with major orchestras, right? Finally getting
the big, lush setting for that big, lush voice.
Yes. Michael Tilson Thomas, the famous conductor,
was a huge fan, a true devotee. He brought her
in to perform with the Los Angeles Philharmonic.
She did a Gershwin program with the New Jersey
Symphony that was broadcast on PBS. And she won
an Emmy for that show in 1981. She did. And then
a Grammy in 1982 for the album that came from
it, Gershwin Live. It was this incredible validation.
She was finally being presented in the setting
her voice deserved, not in front of a small combo,
but surrounded by a full 80 -piece symphony orchestra.
Finally, she was in a tuxedo setting that matched
the sheer elegance of her instrument. But she
wasn't just doing Gershwin and the American Songbook.
She also fell in love with a completely different
sound around this time. Brazil. Ah, yes, the
Brazilian connection. This is my absolute favorite
era of her music. Sarah traveled to South America
and just fell head over heels for Rio de Janeiro.
She said it was the greatest, most beautiful
place she'd ever been. And naturally, she wanted
to record that music. Bossa Nova seems like a
perfect fit for her voice. That cool, complex
harmony, the sophisticated melodies. It was a
match made in heaven. She went into the studio
and recorded an entire album called I Love Brazil.
It featured legends of Brazilian music like...
Antonio Carlos Jobim and Milton Nascimento. It
was a passion project. And it must have been
a huge hit. You would think. But. And here is
that industry struggle rearing its ugly head
again. She took the finished album to her label
at the time, Atlantic Records, and they rejected
it. They rejected an album with Sarah Vaughan
singing Jobim. Why? They said it had no hits.
They listened to it and said they couldn't hear
a single. They wanted another. brokenhearted
melody. Unbelievable. That's just musical malpractice.
They have Sarah Vaughan singing Antonio Carlos
Jobim and they pass. They pass. So she walked,
she took the master tapes and gave them to Norman
Grants, who was famously Ella Fitzgerald's manager.
He released it on his own label, Pablo Records.
And of course, the album was a... critical and
commercial success and got nominated for a Grammy.
It seems like there's a clear pattern here. Every
time she trusted her own artistic gut, she won.
And every time she listened to the suits, she
was miserable. That is a very, very accurate
summary of her entire career. Okay, let's move
to the final act, section seven. We're in the
late 1980s now. Her health is starting to decline,
but she is not slowing down. Not at all. She's
a grand dame of music now. She's receiving major
honors. She gets a star on the Hollywood Walk
of Fame. But musically, she's still taking these
incredible risks. And there's this project involving
the Pope. What was that about? Yes, it was a
project called The Planet is Alive, Let It Live.
It's a very unusual symphonic piece based on
poems that were written by Pope John Paul II.
That is not something you see on the Top 40.
That is a deep cut, even for her. Definitely
not. And then there's the South Pacific recording.
This is a great story. Gives you such a visual.
She was brought into a studio to sing Happy Talk
and Bali Hai for a new all -star recording of
the musical. Who else was on it? Actual opera
stars, Kiriti Kanawa and... Jose Carreras. The
opera world again coming back to her. Right.
But Sarah, while the opera singers stood there
stiffly at their microphones, she sat down on
the studio floor to sing her parts. Just completely
relaxed, grounded, doing her thing. That is so
cool. It's like she's saying, I'm at home here.
This is my world. Just sitting on the floor,
out singing everybody. And then we have the full
circle moment. The perfect ending to the story,
really. It's 1989. Quincy Jones is recording
his massive crossover album. Back on the Block.
This was a huge album. Everyone who was anyone
was on it. Ray Charles, Ice -T, Chaka Khan, Big
Daddy Kane. It was a cultural event, and he brings
in Sarah Vaughan for one track, a scatting duet
with Ella Fitzgerald. The woman she opened for
at the Apollo all the way back in 1942. 46 years
later, it was their only studio recording together.
And very sadly, it was Sarah's final studio recording
ever. Because she was sick by this point. She
was. In 1989, while she was in the middle of
a run of shows at the Blue Note Jazz Club in
New York, she collapsed and was diagnosed with
lung cancer. It moved very fast. She died on
April 3, 1990, at her home in California. She
was only 66. That feels so young. So young for
a voice that sounds so timeless. It really is.
For a voice that timeless, it feels like we were
robbed of a whole third act. The sources say
she was at home watching a TV movie that featured
her adopted daughter, Paris Vaughn, when she
passed away. And her funeral was back in New
York, right? Back where it all began, at Mount
Zion Baptist Church, the same place she played
piano for rehearsals as a little girl. Wow. From
Mount Zion to the Apollo to all the world stages
and then back to Mount Zion. It's a complete
journey, a perfect circle. So let's try to wrap
this up. When we look back at the legacy of Sarah
Vaughan, what's the big takeaway for you? What
stands out? I think we have to go back to that
nickname, the divine one. It sounds so grandiose,
maybe even a little silly, but in her case, it
fits. We're talking about, as Gary Giddens described
her voice, a four -octave muscle of infinite
flexibility. It wasn't just a voice. It was a
superpower. It was something that didn't quite
seem humanly possible. But more than that for
me is that she refused to be boxed in. In a 1982
interview, she said something that I think is
so telling. She said, quote, I don't know why
people call me a jazz singer. I'm not putting
jazz down, but I'm not a jazz singer. I like
all kinds of music. She defied the labels. The
industry wanted her to be one thing, a pop singer,
a jazz singer. But she was all of it. Pop, jazz,
opera, Brazilian. She just sang Sarah Vaughan
music. She defied the algorithm before algorithms
even existed. Exactly. And that's the takeaway.
She contained multitudes. So here is our final
provocative thought for you, the listener. We
want you to go listen to one of her signature
songs. Go listen to Send in the Clowns or Misty
or, if you're feeling brave, even Brokenhearted
Melody. But... Don't just listen to the melody
or the lyrics. Listen to the mechanics. Listen
to the very end of a phrase. Hear how she bends
the pitch just slightly, almost imperceptibly.
Hear how she moves the microphone away from her
mouth to create a fade out that no fader on a
mixing board could ever replicate. Listen for
that shift from the deep burnished contralto
up to that delicate ringing soprano, sometimes
in the same word. Treat it like you're listening
to a masterclass in physics and art combined,
because when you listen to Sarah Vaughan, that's
exactly what it was. It truly was the divine
one. Thanks for diving deep with us today. We'll
catch you on the next one.