Lee Wiley
Lee Wiley ( born October 9, 1908 in Fort Gibson, Oklahoma, † December 11, 1975 in New York City ) was an American jazz singer.
Life and work
After briefly studying in Tulsa Lee Wiley went to New York to try a singing career. This began in the Leo Reisman band in Central Park Casino in New York, with whom she also appeared in Chicago. The singing style of their early years was influenced by Mildred Bailey and Ethel Waters. Their first hit with the band Reisman was the Vincent Youmans "Time on my Hands". In 1933 she left Reisman's band, worked with Paul Whiteman and later with the Casa Loma Orchestra, with whom she recorded "A Hundred Years from Today", and the Dorsey Brothers, and Johnny Green. She also worked closely with the composer Victor Young together ( with whom she was also friends ), with different titles arisen for Lee Wiley wrote the lyrics, as the song " Got The South In My Soul " and " Anytime, Anyday, Anywhere "; last was a rhythm and blues hit in the 1950s. Wiley is also guest star in the Paul Whiteman Orchestra and appears as cover art on radio magazines.
After a long absence from the music scene due to illness - it was suspected tuberculosis - Lee Wiley had a comeback in 1939. She belonged to the musician to circle around Eddie Condon and took a 78s album set of eight Gershwin songs for the small record label " Liberty Music Shops " on. The set was a commercial success and was then continued with another album sets, the music of Cole Porter (1940 ), Richard Rodgers & Lorenz Hart ( 1940 and 1954), Harold Arlen (1943) and Vincent Youmans and Irving Berlin ( 1951) were dedicated. Was accompanied by musicians like the singer Bunny Berigan, Bud Freeman, Max Kaminsky, Fats Waller, Billy Butterfield, Bobby Hackett, Eddie Condon, and the bandleader Jess Stacy, with the Lee Wiley was married for several years. In the 1940s, she appeared with Stacy (in its July 1945 to May 1946 existing big band, she sang ), as well on as with Eddie Condon in radio shows and in the concerts at New York's " Town Hall " and the Ritz Theatre in the war years.
Wiley's career continued in the 1950s with the Columbia label continued with the release of the album Night in Manhattan ( 1950). In 1954 she opened, accompanied by Bobby Hackett, the very first Newport Jazz Festival. In the same year she appeared on an album by Ruby Braff. Created two of their best albums, West of the Moon (1956 ) and A Touch of the Blues ( 1957) In the second half of the decade.
In the 1960s, Wiley drew largely back from the scene, nor 1963, in a television film on ( Something About Lee Wiley ), in which she told her life story. In 1971, the last album, "Back Home Again". Her last public appearance was a concert at New York's Carnegie Hall in 1972 as a program point of the New York Jazz Festival ( the New York branch of the Newport Festival ), where it was enthusiastically received, and again played with Bobby Hackett.
Lee Wiley was in the 1930s a fairly popular singer in the United States: It was considered because of their chosen repertoire and their personality strong expression by many to be one of the most important white jazz singers .. the first jazz singer who (from 1939) was albums with recorded music to individual composers such as George Gershwin.
Will Friedwald acknowledges in his book Singing Voices Lee Wiley in the same breath with Mildred Bailey Connee Boswell and who were the female pioneers in the era of the band singers in the early 30. Only with the RCA album West of the Moon ( 1956) she would have created the " ups and downs " a masterpiece after long years.
Auswahldiskographie
- Eddie Condon: 1944-1946 ( Classics )
- Dorsey Brothers: Harlem Lullaby (Hep, 1933)
- Jess Stacy: Ec- Stacy (ASV 1935-1945 )
- Lee Wiley & Ruby Braff Quartet: Duologue ( Black Lion, 1954)
- Lee Wiley & Billy Butterfield Orchestra: A Touch of the Blues ( RCA, 1958)