Daily Dose Of Jazz…
On February 8, 1947 Kerrie Agnes Biddell was born in the inner-city community of Kings Cross in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. An only child two pianist parents, her mother an accomplished jazz pianist and her father a part-time pianist, she attended St. Vincent’s Convent at the age of six, soon after her father left her mother. In 1962, she suffered a collapsed lung and rheumatoid arthritis, the latter of which affected her piano playing, so she decided to become a singer.
At twenty, Kerrie sang background vocals for Dusty Springfield and impressed, Springfield suggested she become a lead singer. She joined a local band, The Echoes, then in 1968, The Affair. With her added voice the group was able to cover various musical styles, such as soul, funk, and pop compositions. In 1969, they competed and won the national competition Hoadley’s Battle of the Sounds in the vocal-group category. The prize was a trip to London, England, the group relocated in mid-1970, only to disband months later. Before disbanding, they recorded Sly and the Family Stone’s Sing a Simple Song, which would become one of Biddell’s signature songs.
Returning to Australia she toured with the Daly-Wilson Big Band, performing swing music. In between her stint with Wilson, she toured with Dudley Moore, Cilla Black, and Buddy Rich. In 1972, married to former alto saxophonist for Sounds Incorporated David Glyde, they moved to Canada and her career as a session singer began soon after. She and her husband toured in the United States, including clubs in Las Vegas. Offered a three-year six-figure contract with the MGM Grand Hotel and Casino, but declined and moved back to Australia, enrolling in the Sydney Conservatorium of Music.
Moving on to a solo career, her first album won two ARIA awards, she sang on hundreds of jingles, television shows and film scores, and joined the faculty of the Jazz Diploma course at the Conservatorium. She wrote a one-woman show, Legends, which later included June Bronhill, Lorrae Desmond, Toni Lamond, and Jeanne Little. In 2001, due to poor health, she retired from performing but continued her teaching career. On 4 September 2014, jazz and session singer and vocal teacher Kerrie Biddell passed away from a stroke on September 5, 2014. She was 67.
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Three Wishes
Earl Coleman’s response to Nica’s question of three wishes reflected his feelings on the state of jazz in America was:
- “To work with conscientiousness…”
- “Preferably in Europe.”
*Excerpt from Three Wishes: An Intimate Look at Jazz Greats – Compiled and Photographed by Pannonica de Koenigswarter
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Hollywood On 52nd Street
Guess Who I Saw Today is a popular jazz song composed by Murray Grand with lyrics by Elisse Boyd. The song was originally composed for Leonard Sillman’s Broadway musical revue New Faces of 1952 in which it was sung by June Carroll.
The revue opened on Broadway at the Royale Theatre on May 16, 1952 and ran for 365 performances. It was produced by Leonard Sillman, directed by John Murray Anderson and John Beal with choreography by Richard Barstow. The sketches were written by Ronny Graham and Brooks. The songs were composed by, among others, Harnick, Graham, Murray Grand and Arthur Siegel.
The cast featured Graham, Kitt, Clary, Virginia Bosler, June Carroll, Virginia De Luce, Alice Ghostley, Patricia Hammerlee, Carol Lawrence, Paul Lynde and Bill Milliken. De Luce and Graham won the 1952 Theatre World Award. The revue marked Kitt’s Broadway debut, singing a sultry rendition of “Monotonous”, about how boring a life of luxury was.
Two years later, the name was abridged to New Faces and was adapted into a motion picture filmed in Cinemascope and Eastmancolor and was released by 20th Century Fox on March 6, 1954. It helped jumpstart the Hollywood careers of several young performers including Paul Lynde, Alice Ghostley, Eartha Kitt, Robert Clary, Carol Lawrence, Ronny Graham, performer/writer Mel Brooks (as Melvin Brooks), and lyricist Sheldon Harnick.
Hollywood On 52nd Street
Return to Paradise is a jazz standard that was written by Dimitri Tiomkin and Ned Washington for the movie of the same name. The film was set and principal photography was shot in Samoa and released by United Artists in 1953. It starred Gary Cooper, Barry Jones and Roberta Haynes and the screenplay by Charles Kaufman was based on the 1951 short story Mr. Morgan by James Michener in his short story collection Return to Paradise, his sequel to Tales of the South Pacific.
The Story
During the 1920s, itinerant American beachcomber Mr. Morgan (Cooper) is deposited on the island of Matareva in the South Pacific. Deciding to stay, he is confronted by Pastor Cobbett (Jones), who lost both his father and his wife as a young missionary on the island and rules the island as a Puritanical despot, using local bullies as wardens to enforce his rules. Morgan wins the support of the natives after defeating the wardens with the aid of an empty shotgun.
Morgan has an illegitimate child with an island girl who dies in childbirth. Leaving his daughter with her grandmother he leaves the island, only to return during World War II. Cobbett has changed, his daughter Turia is now grown and in love with a stranded Navy pilot and Morgan now has to face the inevitable possibility of a repeat of his indiscretion with his daughter. Forcing the split by making the pilot and his crew leave the island, Turia is upset but reconciles with her father who decides to stay on with her on the island.
Requisites
Lambert, Hendricks & Ross were a vocalese trio formed by jazz vocalists Dave Lambert, Jon Hendricks and Annie Ross. This was their fourth album of the six they would record before Annie Ross left the group.
The Hottest New Group In Jazz is a 1960 album for the CBS record label and consists of ten compositions recorded: Charleston Alley, Moanin’, Twisted, Bijou, Cloudburst, Centerpiece, Give Me That Wine, Sermonette, Summertime and Everybody’s Boppin’.
The cover photo was taken by Vernon Smith.
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