[speedgibson] Speed Gibson: Jo Stafford

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Posted by Speed Gibson:
Jo Stafford
http://speedgibson.powerblogs.com/posts/1216424993.shtml


   I think Jo Stafford is easily among the top ten female singers ever.
   Her 90 years with us ended today.
   She was as precise and on key as they come. Every note was perfect,
   every phrasing personal. But I was not to really find out about her
   until perhaps 20 years ago when I happened to really listen to her #1
   hit "You Belong to Me" of 1952. Later, I heard my personal favorite
   "No Other Love" and I was hers. That song still gets to me.
   I didn't know it at the time, but I had heard her many years before,
   as "Darlene Edwards" singing with "Jonathan Edwards" on the piano, in
   real life her husband Paul Westin. He would stumble through the
   numbers while she slid oh so gently and yet oh so gratingly on and off
   key, a little ahead and then a little behind the score. My older
   readers may remember morning host Howard Viken on WCCO-AM occasionally
   playing one of their songs, parodies of those awful lounge acts we've
   all endured. Viken would claim that was the voice of Joyce Lamont, who
   did recipes and other homemaking features. If you don't remember this,
   don't feel bad. This was in the early 1960's.
   I'm told by those who know that this is much harder than it sounds,
   especially for an accomplished singer. When asked about it, she
   quipped: "Well, Jo Stafford might have found it difficult, but Darlene
   had no problem at all."
   She could do it for real. She could play it for laughs. Thanks, Jo.
   You, too, Darlene.