Lee Wiley
Encyclopedia
Lee Wiley 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:
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 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 by Bobby 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.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
singer popular in the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s.
Wiley was born in Fort Gibson, Oklahoma
Fort Gibson, Oklahoma
Fort Gibson is a town in Cherokee and Muskogee counties in the U.S. state of Oklahoma. The population was 4,054 at the 2000 census. It is the location of Fort Gibson National Cemetery and is located near at the end of the Cherokees' Trail of Tears at Tahlequah, Oklahoma.Colonel Matthew Arbuckle of...
. While still in her early teens, she left home to pursue a singing career with the Leo Reisman
Leo Reisman
Leo Reisman was a violinist and bandleader in the 1920s and 1930s. Born and reared in Boston, Reisman studied violin as a young man, and formed his own band in 1919. He became famous for having over 80 hits on the popular charts during his career. Jerome Kern called Reisman's orchestra "The...
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
Paul Whiteman
Paul Samuel Whiteman was an American bandleader and orchestral director.Leader of the most popular dance bands in the United States during the 1920s, Whiteman's recordings were immensely successful, and press notices often referred to him as the "King of Jazz"...
and later, the Casa Loma Orchestra. A collaboration with composer Victor Young
Victor Young
Victor Young was an American composer, arranger, violinist and conductor. He was born in Chicago.-Biography:...
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)
- 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 Drosey 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
George Gershwin
George Gershwin was an American composer and pianist. Gershwin's compositions spanned both popular and classical genres, and his most popular melodies are widely known...
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
Cole Porter
Cole Albert Porter was an American composer and songwriter. Born to a wealthy family in Indiana, he defied the wishes of his domineering grandfather and took up music as a profession. Classically trained, he was drawn towards musical theatre...
(1940) and Richard Rodgers
Richard Rodgers
Richard Charles Rodgers was an American composer of music for more than 900 songs and for 43 Broadway musicals. He also composed music for films and television. He is best known for his songwriting partnerships with the lyricists Lorenz Hart and Oscar Hammerstein II...
& Lorenz Hart
Lorenz Hart
Lorenz "Larry" Milton Hart was the lyricist half of the famed Broadway songwriting team Rodgers and Hart...
(1940 and 1954), Harold Arlen
Harold Arlen
Harold Arlen was an American composer of popular music, having written over 500 songs, a number of which have become known the world over. In addition to composing the songs for The Wizard of Oz, including the classic 1938 song, "Over the Rainbow,” Arlen is a highly regarded contributor to the...
(1943), and Vincent Youmans
Vincent Youmans
Vincent Youmans was an American popular composer and Broadway producer.- Life :Vincent Millie Youmans was born in New York City on September 27, 1898 and grew-up on Central Park West on the site where the Mayflower Hotel once stood. His father, a prosperous hat manufacturer, moved the family to...
and Irving Berlin
Irving Berlin
Irving Berlin was an American composer and lyricist of Jewish heritage, widely considered one of the greatest songwriters in American history.His first hit song, "Alexander's Ragtime Band", became world famous...
(1951). The players on these recordings included Bunny Berigan
Bunny Berigan
Rowland Bernard "Bunny" Berigan was an American jazz trumpeter who rose to fame during the swing era, but whose virtuosity and influence were shortened by a losing battle with alcoholism that ended in his early death at age 33. He composed the jazz instrumentals "Chicken and Waffles" and "Blues"...
, Bud Freeman
Bud Freeman
Lawrence "Bud" Freeman was a U.S. jazz musician, bandleader, and composer, known mainly for playing the tenor saxophone, but also able at the clarinet. He had a smooth and full tenor sax style with a heavy robust swing. He was one of the most influential and important jazz tenor saxophonists of...
, Max Kaminsky, Fats Waller
Fats Waller
Fats Waller , born Thomas Wright Waller, was a jazz pianist, organist, composer, singer, and comedic entertainer...
, Billy Butterfield
Billy Butterfield
Billy Butterfield was a band leader, jazz trumpeter, flugelhornist and cornetist.He studied cornet with Frank Simons, but later switched to studying medicine. He did not give up on music and quit medicine after finding success as a trumpeter. Early in his career he played in the band of Austin Wylie...
, Bobby Hackett
Bobby Hackett
Robert Leo "Bobby" Hackett was an US jazz musician who played trumpet, cornet and guitar with the bands of Glenn Miller and Benny Goodman in the late thirties and early forties.-Biography:...
, Eddie Condon
Eddie Condon
Albert Edwin Condon , better known as Eddie Condon, was a jazz banjoist, guitarist, and bandleader. A leading figure in the so-called "Chicago school" of early Dixieland, he also played piano and sang on occasion....
, Stan Freeman
Stan Freeman
Stanley Freeman was an American composer, lyricist, musical arranger, conductor, and studio musician.-Biography:...
, Cy Walter
Cy Walter
Cy Walter was an American café society pianist based in New York City for four decades. Dubbed the "Art Tatum of Park Avenue," he was praised for his extensive repertoire and improvisatory skill...
, and the bandleader Jess Stacy
Jess Stacy
Jess Stacy was an American jazz pianist who gained prominence during the Swing era.-Early life:Stacy was born Jesse Alexandria Stacy in Bird's Point, Missouri, a small town across the Mississippi River from Cairo, Illinois. In 1918 Stacy moved to Cape Girardeau, Missouri...
, 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
Newport Jazz Festival
The Newport Jazz Festival is a music festival held every summer in Newport, Rhode Island, USA. It was established in 1954 by socialite Elaine Lorillard, who, together with husband Louis Lorillard, financed the festival for many years. The couple hired jazz impresario George Wein to organize the...
accompanied by Bobby Hackett
Bobby Hackett
Robert Leo "Bobby" Hackett was an US jazz musician who played trumpet, cornet and guitar with the bands of Glenn Miller and Benny Goodman in the late thirties and early forties.-Biography:...
. 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
Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States, located at 881 Seventh Avenue, occupying the east stretch of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street and West 57th Street, two blocks south of Central Park....
in 1972 as part of the New York Jazz Festival, where she was enthusiastically received.
Selected Discography
- Duologue 1954 (1988)
- Lee Wiley Rarities (1991)
- Hot House Rose (1996)
- The Music of Manhattan 1951 (1998)
- Legendary Song Stylist (1999)
- The Legendary Lee Wiley: Collector's Items 1931-1955 (1999)
- Manhattan Moods: Outstanding Live Recordings (2000)
- Night In Manhattan/Sings Youmans/Sings Berlin (2001)
- Time on My Hands: 24 Original Mono Recordings 1932-1951 (2002)
- Completist's Ultimate Collection Vol.1 (2002)
- Completist's Ultimate Collection Vol.2 (2002)
- The Complete Golden Years Studio Sessions (2003)
- A Touch of the Blues (2003)
- Lee Wiley: Complete Fifties Studio Masters (2003)
- Completist's Ultimate Collection Vol.3 (2004)
- Completist's Ultimate Collection Vol.4 (2004)
- The Carnegie Hall Concert (2004)
- Sings Porter and Gershwin (2004)
- Sings Rodgers, Hart and Arlen (2004)
- S Wonderful (2005)
- Songbooks & Quiet Sensuality: 1933-1951 (2005)
- Follow Your Heart (2005)
- West of the Moon (2007)
- Live on Stage Town Hall New York (2008)
- Back Home Again (2008)
- Lee Wiley. Any Time, Any Day, Anywhere. Her 25 finest (1932-1954) (2009)
- What Is Love? (2009)