Lee Wiley
| Lee Wiley | |
|---|---|
 |
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| Born | October 9, 1908 Fort Gibson, Oklahoma, U.S. |
| Died | December 11, 1975 (aged 67) New York City, New York, U.S. |
| Spouse(s) | Jess Stacy (1943-1948) Nat Tischenkel (1966-1975; her death) |
Lee Wiley (October 9, 1908 – December 11, 1975) was an American jazz singer popular in the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s.
Wiley was born in Fort Gibson, Oklahoma. While still in her early teens, she left home to pursue a singing career with the Leo Reisman band. Her career was temporarily interrupted by a fall while horseback riding. Wiley suffered temporary blindness, but recovered, and at the age of 19 was back with Reisman again, with whom she recorded three songs: “Take It From Me,” “Time On My Hands,” and her own composition, “Got The South In My Soul.” She sang with Paul Whiteman and later, the Casa Loma Orchestra. A collaboration with composer Victor Young resulted in several songs for which Wiley wrote the lyrics, including “Got The South in My Soul” and “Anytime, Anyday, Anywhere,” the latter an R&B hit in the 1950s.
During the early 1930s, Wiley recorded very little, and many sides were rejected:
- Take it From Me (with Leo Reisman’s Orchestra, June 30, 1931, issued)
- Time On My Hands (with Leo Reisman’s Orchestra, October 19, 1931, rejected & October 26, 1931, issued)
- Got The South In My Soul (with Leo Reisman’s Orchestra, June 15, 1932, issued)
- Just So You’ll Remember (with unknown orchestra, January 21, 1933, rejected)
- A Tree Was A Tree (with unknown orchestra, February, 1933, rejected)
- You’re An Old Smoothie (duet with Billy Hughes) (with Victor Young’s Orchestra, January 21, 1933, issued)
- You’ve Got Me Crying Again &
- I Gotta Right to Sing The Blues (with Dorsey Brothers, March 7, 1933, both rejected)
- Let’s Call It A Day (with Dorsey Brothers, April 15, 1933 and May 3, 1933, both rejected)
- Repeal The Blues &
- Easy Come, Easy Go (with Johnny Green’s Orchestra, March 17, 1934, issued)
- Careless Love &
- Motherless Child (with Justin Ring’s? Orchestra, August 13, 1934, issued)
- Hands Across The Table &
- I’ll Follow My Secret Heart (with Victor Young’s? Orchestra, November 26, 1934, issued)
- Mad About The Boy (with Victor Young’s Orchestra, August 25, 1935, rejected)
- What Is Love? &
- I’ve Got You Under My Skin (with Victor Young’s Orchestra, February 10, 1937, issued)
In 1939, Wiley recorded eight Gershwin songs on 78s with a small group for Liberty Music Shops. The set sold well and was followed by 78s dedicated to the music of Cole Porter(1940) and Richard Rodgers & Lorenz Hart (1940 and 1954), Harold Arlen (1943), and 10″ LPs dedicated to the music of Vincent Youmans and Irving Berlin (1951). The players on these recordings included Bunny Berigan, Bud Freeman, Max Kaminsky, Fats Waller, Billy Butterfield, Bobby Hackett, Eddie Condon, Stan Freeman, Cy Walter, and the bandleader Jess Stacy, to whom Wiley was married for a number of years. These influential albums launched the concept of a “songbook” (often featuring lesser-known songs), which was later widely imitated by other singers.
Wiley’s career made a resurgence in 1950 with the much admired ten-inch album Night in Manhattan. In 1954, she opened the very first Newport Jazz Festival accompanied byBobby Hackett. Later in the decade she recorded two of her finest albums, West of the Moon (1956) and A Touch of the Blues (1957). In the 1960s, Wiley retired, although she acted in a 1963 television film, Something About Lee Wiley, which told her life story. The film stimulated interest in the singer. Her last public appearance was a concert in Carnegie Hall in 1972 as part of the New York Jazz Festival, where she was enthusiastically received.
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