 | | Irving Berlin (1888-1989) was the most successful songwriter of the 20th century. Though, like his contemporaries, he spent the better part of his career writing songs (usually both words and music) to be used in Broadway musicals, he is better remembered for the songs themselves than for the shows (and sometimes films) in which they were introduced. |
 | | The great musical border crosser of the twentieth century, George Gershwin excelled in the fields of concert music and popular song alike. |
 | | Dancer, actor, and singer Fred Astaire worked steadily in various entertainment media during nine decades of the 20th century. |
 | | Johnny Mercer's main claim to immortality is his incredible songwriting output, penning the lyrics or music and lyrics to roughly 1,500 songs. |
 | | Cole Porter was born the grandson of wealthy Indiana entrepreneur J.O. Cole and demonstrated musical talent from an early age. |
 | | Singer/actress Judy Garland had a varied career that began in vaudeville and extended into movies, records, radio, television, and personal appearances. |
 | | Jerome Kern was born on January 27, 1885, in New York City, the son of Fannie Kakeles and Henry Kern. |
 | | Before the rock & roll revolution, Rosemary Clooney was one of the most popular female singers in America, rising to superstardom during the golden age of adult pop. |
 | | "The First Lady of Song," Ella Fitzgerald was arguably the finest female jazz singer of all time (although some may vote for Sarah Vaughan or Billie Holiday). |
 | | For a mild-mannered man whose music was always easy on the ear, Nat King Cole managed to be a figure of considerable controversy during his 30 years as a professional musician. |
 | | Frank Sinatra was arguably the most important popular music figure of the 20th century, his only real rivals for the title being Bing Crosby, Elvis Presley, and the Beatles. |
 | | One of the great composers of the American popular song, Hoagy Carmichael differed from most of the others (with the obvious exception of Duke Ellington) in that he was also a fine performer. |
 | | Peggy Lee's alluring tone, distinctive delivery, breadth of material, and ability to write many of her own songs made her one of the most captivating artists of the vocal era, from her breakthrough on the Benny Goodman hit "Why Don't You Do Right" to her many solo successes, singles including "Mañana," "Lover" and "Fever" that showed her bewitching vocal power, a balance between sultry swing and impeccable musicianship. |
 | | Tony Bennett's career has enjoyed three distinct phases, each of them very successful. In the early '50s, he scored a series of major hits that made him one of the most popular recording artists of the time. |
 | | Bing Crosby was, without doubt, the most popular and influential media star of the first half of the 20th century. |
 | | Singer/actress Lena Horne's primary occupation was nightclub entertaining, a profession she pursued successfully around the world for more than 60 years, from the 1930s to the 1990s. |
 | | Mel Tormé was a jazz-oriented pop singer who worked at his craft steadily from the '40s to the '90s, primarily in nightclubs and concert halls. |
 | | Her husky, surprisingly sensual voice and exquisitely cool readings of pop standards distinguished her singing, but Lee Wiley earns notice as one of the best early jazz singers by recognizing the superiority of American popular song and organizing a set of songs around a common composer or theme -- later popularized as the songbook or concept LP. |
 | | Composer Richard Rodgers (1902-1979) and lyricist Oscar Hammerstein, II (1895-1960) both had extensive careers in Broadway theater music before they scored their first hit together with Oklahoma! in 1943. |
 | | One of the prototypical Italian-American crooners, Vic Damone parlayed a smooth, mellow baritone into big-time pop stardom during the '40s and '50s. |
 | | Joe Williams was the last great big-band singer, a smooth baritone who graced the rejuvenated Count Basie Orchestra during the 1950s and captivated audiences well into the '90s. |
 | | Singer/pianist Michael Feinstein was both a prime motivator and a beneficiary of a renewed interest in pre-rock popular music that started in the 1980s, a trend that also found Linda Ronstadt selling millions of copies of albums of traditional pop made with conductor Nelson Riddle and that fueled the success of Harry Connick Jr. |
 | | Stephen Sondheim was the most highly regarded composer/lyricist for the musical theater in his generation. |
 | | Though she was the epitome of the vocal cool movement of the 1950s, June Christy was a warm, chipper vocalist able to stretch out her impressive voice on bouncy swing tunes and set herself apart from other vocalists with her deceptively simple enunciation. |
 | | The first popular jazz singer to move audiences with the intense, personal feeling of classic blues, Billie Holiday changed the art of American pop vocals forever. |
 | | One of the most technically gifted and popular vocalists of the immediate postwar period, Jo Stafford effortlessly walked the line between breezy pop and the more serious art of post-big-band jazz singing. |
 | | One of the most popular vocalists between the end of World War II and the rise of rock & roll in the mid-'50s, Perry Como perfected the post-big-band approach to pop music by lending his own irresistible, laid-back singing -- influenced by Bing Crosby and Russ Columbo -- to the popular hits of the day on radio, TV, and LP. |
 | | Recognized throughout much of his career as "the world's greatest living entertainer," Sammy Davis, Jr. |
 | | A sultry, smoky-voiced master of understatement, Julie London enjoyed considerable popularity during the cool era of the 1950s. |
 | | Actor/singer Mandy Patinkin carved out a varied career on-stage, in films, in the recording studio, and on television. |
 | | A respected Broadway name due to his Guys and Dolls and How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, a composer who wrote half a dozen wartime songs including "Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition," a Hollywood lyric-writer for several 1940s films -- it appears that Frank Loesser had several careers packed into his one life. |
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 | | Enjoying great success in music, film, television, and the stage, Dean Martin was less an entertainer than an icon, the eternal essence of cool. |
 | | Doris Day has packed four careers into one lifetime, two each in music and movies. The pity is that all most people remember are her movies, from Teacher's Pet (1957) onward, as the quintessential all-American girl, the perpetually virginal screen heroine, cast opposite such icons of masculinity as Clark Gable and, rather ironically, Rock Hudson. |
 | | Louis Armstrong was the first important soloist to emerge in jazz, and he became the most influential musician in the music's history. |
 | | Ethel Merman was the leading American musical theater performer of her generation, creating roles in 13 Broadway musicals between 1930 and 1959, and continuing to appear in shows occasionally through 1970. |
 | | The so-called Rat Pack wasn't a group in the normal sense, but consisted of a loose confederation of actors, comedians, and singers lumped together by the media under that name in the early '60s. |
 | | With lyricists Lorenz Hart and later Oscar Hammerstein II, composer Richard Rodgers wrote dozens of the best-known songs in American popular music and created what stand as perhaps the three most popular American musicals -- Oklahoma!, South Pacific, and The Sound of Music (to say nothing of Carousel and The King and I). |
 | | One of America's most popular entertainers long after her mid-'40s commercial peak, Dinah Shore was the first major vocalist to break away from the big-band format and begin a solo-billed career. |
 | | Cy Coleman did have smll impact on jazz scene, but his major importance comes as composer and force in theater. |
 | | No other entertainer proved successful in as many fields as Eddie Cantor during the 1920s and '30s. Nicknamed "Banjo Eyes" and "the Apostle of Pep" for his endless reserves of energy and showmanship (he would literally jump around the stage while performing his favorite numbers), he began his career touring in vaudeville, was promoted to the more legitimate theater of Florenz Ziegfeld's Follies, recorded many hits for Columbia, translated the success to film during the late '20s, became the biggest radio star of the '30s with the Chase & Sanborn Hour, and later moved to television as well. |
 | | A solid jazz singer whose early recordings tended to be forgotten after her ascendancy into the commercial sphere during the mid-'50s, Kay Starr was among the first pop singer to capitalize on the "rock fad" with her 1955 novelty "Rock and Roll Waltz. |
 | | At the commercial height of her career in the '60s, actress/singer Julie Andrews could claim to be the primary performer associated with the longest-running musical in Broadway history, the highest-grossing Hollywood film ever made, and the biggest-selling album of all time. |
 | | Possessor of one of the most wondrous voices of the 20th century, Sarah Vaughan ranked with Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holiday in the very top echelon of female jazz singers. |
 | | Easily the most solid and long-lasting vocalist of his era, Andy Williams' laid-back delivery and expansive voice charmed audiences for decades, from his first appearance with a brother quartet into his eighth decade of performance as the head of his own dinner theater in Branson, Missouri. |
 | | His face was more famous than his voice, but Robert Goulet recorded a string of popular albums for Columbia during the 1960s, striking the pop charts with several hits and earning a 1962 Grammy Award. |
 | | In step with Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers was one half of the most legendary dancing team in film history; she was also a successful dramatic actress, even winning a Best Actress Oscar. |
 | | Jerry Vale's beautiful high-tenor voice graced many of the most enchanting pop songs of the '50s and '60s, including a parade of Italian-American favorites like "Innamorata (Sweetheart)," "Volare," "Amore, Scusami," and his signature song, "Al Di La. |
 | | With his cheery tenor voice and ever-present ukulele, Cliff "Ukelele Ike" Edwards was a major vaudeville star of the 1920s who branched out into record-making (selling a reported 74 million discs), filmmaking (appearing in as many as 100 films), radio, and television. |
 | | A superior ballad singer and a talented pianist, Shirley Horn put off potential success until finally becoming a major attraction while in her fifties. |
![St. Louis Woman [Original Broadway Cast] / Harold Arlen and His Songs Album Cover](http://images.slacker.com/isv1/album/v1/775062/aol/1/center/5,0/70.jpg "St. Louis Woman [Original Broadway Cast] / Harold Arlen and His Songs Album Cover")
