Rosemary Clooney

Thanks I love those pictures I saw them ages ago and they are lovely!

I really didn't know much about Rosemary until I started following George's career-then I bought her greatest hits CD and loved it...awesome voice!

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Rosemary Clooney musical makes world debut in Dayton


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HANDOUT/RAY WYLAM Tory Ross portrays Rosemary Clooney in the new play, "Tenderly." Here, she's pictured with Nick Clooney following the opening night performance.

Rosemary Clooney musical makes world debut in Dayton 2/22/12

Dayton’s historic Victoria Theatre seems the ideal venue for the rags-to-riches story of the little girl from Maysville, Ky., who grew up to become an American entertainment icon.
Many of those gathered Tuesday night for the world premiere of “Tenderly: The Rosemary Clooney Musical” remembered the famous pop singer from her early days in the 1940s on Cincinnati’s WLW Radio when she and her sister, Betty, were known as “The Clooney Sisters.”
Opening night, which ended with an enthusiastic standing ovation, was a time for reminiscences. Seated in the audience were members of the Clooney family, including Rosemary’s brother, Nick.
“We were Depression kids, we were poor growing up, and we used to sing on Sundays and entertain ourselves,” an obviously excited Clooney said just before the curtain rose. “What she did was never easy but it was simple — she understood the poetry of the song.”
The homegrown theatrical production, produced by The Human Race Theatre Company for the Victoria’s Broadway series, got its start in Dayton as a musical workshop production. Written by Cincinnati’s Janet Yates Vogt and Mark Friedman, the show stars Muse Machine/Miami Valley School graduate Tory Ross, who depicts Clooney through every stage of her often-troubled life. Human Race veteran Scott Stoney juggles parts that include Clooney’s therapist, family members, famous friends — Frank Sinatra, Shecky Greene — and her husbands — actor Jose Ferrer and dance instructor Dante DiPaolo.
The audience was particularly delighted by the Stoney/Ross rendition of “Sisters,” with Stoney singing and dancing the role of Betty Clooney. Songs ranged from “White Christmas” and “Hey There” to “Mambo Italiano” and “Come On-A My House.”
Nick Clooney, who pronounced the new show “perfect with the arc of our lives,” said he was especially touched by “When October Goes.”
“That was an important song at that time of her life,” he said. “It’s her ‘September Song.’ ”
Those in attendance were invited to an after-show reception and the chance to meet the writers, cast members, and Clooney family. Kevin Moore directed the show; music director/arranger was Scot Woolley. On display at the theater are artifacts on loan from The Rosemary Clooney House — sheet music and records, costume accessories, photos and Rosemary Clooney dolls.
Heidi Thomason of Kettering said she traveled with her dad to visit Rosemary Clooney’s home in Kentucky and said her favorite item on display was the family tree.
“What an amazing and talented person!” she said after the show. “I had no idea that she had such a sad and depressing life. Her music is so happy and so full of life that you would never have known she was hurting inside. This is a very beautiful play, and I loved the music and the era.”
Mark Sendroff, Rosemary Clooney’s attorney and friend, came from New York to see the show on Tuesday and said he thought the popular singer would have been “very flattered” by the production overall.
“She had a very interesting story, and she was never shy about describing the ups-and-downs,” Sendroff said. “She was nurturing and she was brilliantly talented. I think Tory Ross did her a great justice tonight.”

How to go

What: “Tenderly: The Rosemary Clooney Musical,”
Where: Victoria Theatre, First and Main Streets, Dayton
When: 8 p.m. Tuesday through Friday, 2 p.m. and 8 p.m. Saturdays, 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. Sundays through March 4. The 90-minute show has no intermission.
Tickets: $40 to $83
Produced by: The Human Race Theatre Company for the Victoria’s Broadway Series
More info: (937) 228-3630, toll free (888) 228-3630 or [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

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great shape
as usual

Nice videos of Nick ....

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Thanks Merlin for finding those two lovely glimpses of Nick's warmth and his love for his sister Rosemary.

Does anyone know how the musical is doing ?

soooooooo sweet!!!

TENDERLY: THE ROSEMARY CLOONEY MUSICAL
FEBRUARY 22, 2012

Tenderly: The Rosemary Clooney Musical premieres in Dayton
By
Michael Woody
Dayton Performing Arts Examiner

Prior to seeing the world premiere of ‘Tenderly: The Rosemary Clooney: Musical,‘ my only knowledge about the famed vocal artist is she’s George’s aunt.
Now I know all about the tumultuous life & career of Clooney as the staged production provides vivid glimpse of her journey towards stardom. For the first time anywhere, the Victoria Theatre is thrilled to host ‘Tenderly,’ through March 4.

Beyond just being a typical musical, ‘Tenderly’ serves as like a trip into the innermost workings of Clooney’s mind as we eavesdrop on her sessions with a psychiatrist.
After falling into obscurity due to suffering a mental breakdown, while on stage, we follow her rise back up to celebrity status. Each monumental step towards her own self discovery is portrayed with a hit song.

The cast is comprised of only two actors, but they provide a wealth of character and the same range found in a full ensemble. Rosemary Clooney is masterfully played by Tory Ross, whose voice and whole performance is in perfect tune from beginning to end. She’s as delightful to watch when cheery as battling the demons of despair. It takes a lot of strength to carry such a show, plus be on stage for the entire 90 minutes, and Ross does so with seemingly little effort

However, her talents are equally matched by a legend to the Dayton stage, Scott Stoney, who plays the psychiatrist, as well as all of Rosemary’s family, friends and everyone else. With just a slight change of voice, Stoney transforms from Rosemary’s mother into a cast of characters including Frank Sinatra, Merv Griffin, and Bing Crosby. The transitions are all seamless and leaves no wonder of, who is he now?

A collection of Clooney’s music is featured including Come On- A My House, Hey There, and of course White Christmas. The magical voice of Ross captures the spirit of Rosemary.
A favorite of mine is Count Your Blessings Instead Of Sheep, a tenderly sweet song to highlight an emotional scene. Another bright spot is the rendition of Sisters, for which Stoney portrays Rosemary’s sister, Betty.

The staging is simple but fulfills its purpose and the work of Ross & Stoney paints so vibrant of a picture that it equals a million dollar set. In addition, for a nice touch, a large screen hanging in the center of the stage shows pictures of many people who are portrayed.

Tenderly: A Rosemary Clooney Musical is a show, written by Janet Yates Vogt & Mark Friedman, that’s bound to build a long legacy and its voyage all begins in Dayton.
Don’t miss its launch at the Victoria Theatre now through March 4. Call Ticket Center Stage for tickets and show times at (937) 228-3630 or (888) 228-2630 or visit [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]




Continue reading on Examiner.com Tenderly: The Rosemary Clooney Musical premieres in Dayton - Dayton Performing Arts | Examiner.com [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

can we have any kind of clip from it?

thanks!

the sister homage was sooo sweet

but the first one!

oh my!! G is too old?!?

LOL!

No that's all I could find.
Some photos are on Merlin's link on 23 Feb above.

It sounds a lovely show and I'd imagine quite moving too.

yes....

Hmmm... birthday choice? dayton is not too far. It's on my choice list

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Red Garters’ dress at Rosemary Clooney House

A dress worn by Rosemary Clooney in “Red Garters,” her second movie (1953), will be added to the Rosemary Clooney House museum collection Saturday in Augusta, Ky.

Nick and Nina Clooney, her brother and sister-in-law, will join museum proprietors Steve and Heather French Henry for an unveiling ceremony at 2 p.m. Saturday at the museum, 106 East Riverside Drive, durring Augusta’s annual Art in the Garden festival.

Says Rosemary Clooney historian Kathy Brown: “This costume was designed for Rosemary by multi-Oscar winner, Edith Head, for her second movie ‘Red Garters’ (a musical spoof of westerns) which was released in 1953 and co-starred Guy Mitchell, Jack Carson, Buddy Ebsen, Pat Crowley and Gene Berry. The gown to be dedicated is the most elaborate of those worn by Rosemary’s character “Calaveres Kate” and can be seen on her when she sings the title song ‘Red Garters’ while dancing on a bar with a host of chorus girls behind her.

“The movie ‘Red Garters’ is special to fans of Rosemary and the museum, as her second husband, Dante DiPaolo, was a dancer in the chorus and served as her dancing coach during rehearsals and filming. Dante can be seen in many scenes in the movie including the one where she’s wearing museum’s latest addition.”

Rosemary’s former residence on the Ohio River also has the world’s largest collection of costumes and memorabilia from her movie “White Christmas,” photos and music from her singing career, pictures and memorabilia of longtime friend Bob Hope, and an exhibit of costumes and memorabilia from her nephew George Clooney. Rosemary died in 2002 at age 74.

Here’s a link to more information about the museum.

Here’s the release from Kathy Brown:


Edith Head designed costume worn by Rosemary Clooney in Red Garter’s to be dedicated at museum

Saturday, June 2 at 2:00 p.m. The Rosemary Clooney House, 106 East Riverside Drive, Augusta, KY

Members of Rosemary Clooney’s family, including Nick and Nina Clooney will join Steve and Heather French Henry, proprietor’s of The Rosemary Clooney House, on Saturday, June 2nd at 2 p.m. for the dedication and unveiling of the newest costume to be added to the museum’s collection. The dedication is taking place as part of Augusta’s annual Art in the Garden

This costume was designed for Rosemary by multi-Oscar winner, Edith Head, for her second movie Red Garters (a musical spoof of westerns) which was released in 1953 and co-starred Guy Mitchell, Jack Carson, Buddy Ebsen, Pat Crowley and Gene Berry. The gown to be dedicated is the most elaborate of those worn by Rosemary’s character “Calaveres Kate” and can be seen on her when she sings the title song Red Garters while dancing on a bar with a host of chorus girls behind her.

The movie Red Garters is special to fans of Rosemary and the museum, as her second husband, Dante DiPaolo, was a dancer in the chorus and served as her dancing coach during rehearsals and filming. Dante can be seen in many scenes in the movie including the one where she’s wearing museum’s latest addition.

Sylvia Lewis (sylvialewis.net), a dancer in movies such as Singing in the Rain, Cha Cha Cha Boom and television shows like The Colgate Comedy Hour and Where’s Raymond?, where she also served as choreographer for Ray Bolgers elaborate dance numbers, was one of the chorus girls in Red Garters, including in the title number where Rosemary strips off this gown. Sylvia recently said of Rosemary, “Anyone who ever knew Rosemary, knows she was a genuine sweetie. On the set, she was a total pro, with no pretense, no temperament, just a willingness to do her best at all times.” Of this particular scene which required Rosemary to “strip” Sylvia recalled that Rosemary was “indeed a little self conscious.”

For more information about The Rosemary Clooney House, it’s collection, and the life and career of Rosemary, please visit [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

From youtube..."
Rosemary Clooney guest starred in two episodes of her nephew's hit tv series ER. She played an alzheimer's patient Mary Cavanaugh, a Girl Singer. Rosemary was nominated for a Grammy for her appearance in "Going Home." During the two episodes she sings "Nice and Easy," "Time Flies," "No One Knows Better Than Me," and "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas.""

There are many videos here of Rosemary !

Thanks for these Joanna! Wonderful woman!

she has the most sincere look on her face when she is reacting to people. You just know she sees your soul thru your eyes.

This is my favorite Rosemary Clooney song!

good choice Lorna!

The evening breeze caressed the trees tenderly
The trembling trees embraced the breeze tenderly
Then you and I came wandering by
And lost in a sigh were we
The shore was kissed by sea and mist tenderly
I can't forget how two hearts met breathlessly
Your arms opened wide and closed me inside
You took my lips, you took my love so tenderly


Lovely song
(and baby at the end! )

I have not heard her song before - thanks LornaDoone!

So tenderly .

it's me wrote:The evening breeze caressed the trees tenderly
The trembling trees embraced the breeze tenderly
Then you and I came wandering by
And lost in a sigh were we
The shore was kissed by sea and mist tenderly
I can't forget how two hearts met breathlessly
Your arms opened wide and closed me inside
You took my lips, you took my love so tenderly


Lovely song
(and baby at the end! )

I guess it's a picture of the person who put together the tribute. I was wondering if they were a huge fan because of the magazine covers and photos. It looks like it might be from someone's collection of Rosemary Clooney memorabilia.

And about Rosemary's singing - I love the way she controls her notes. Unlike so many singers today, she doesn't SHOUT her songs. Her voice caresses them and the tonal? quality (not sure if that's the correct word to use) of the notes is just so beautiful. I really love her voice!

I hadn't seen this one before...written by Nick....

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very nice! thanks Merlin!

Lovely thanks Merlin.
Sounds like Nick's tribute to Nina.

Merlin thank you so much for bringing my attention to this page, I love the video that Joanna put here last year. I am still listening to it. Rosemary was a wonderful singer and person. She had her heartaches too. With much respect for her my favorite is "I'm Confessing That I Love You."

I hadn't heard Nick speak that much at that age, I can see where George Gets his wonderful speaking voice from. Right now Rosemary is singing "i'll Be Seeing You," another favorite. She was unbelievable. This is when songs had meaning and shame on me I can relate most of them to George. I think I am stuck here until this video is over all 1hr & 17min of it. I have to thank both you & Joanna and I will get to what you posted.

Mazy....Pleased you're enjoying Rosemary.

Yes Joanna this is my kind of music and lite opera. I will listen to it again tomorrow when I finish my painting. Thanks again

Thanks for the vid, so sweet!!

I said it before but Rosemary was truly a gifted woman not only for her talent but for her Love as a human being. Just like George and I can see Nick too. As George said "she could serve up a song."

I've been watching all day very melancholy seeing as I/m on shaky ground anyway I'd better quit. Love you George.

@joana , this avatar is amazing !!!!!

sarah ali wrote:@joana , this avatar is amazing !!!!!

Pleased you like him in B/W too !

Rosemary would have been 85 today. Happy Birthday Rosie! I'm sure she is leading the heavenly choir!!

Wow! 85? She would surely sing that special day AUGURI!

Happy Birthday, Rosie!!

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Nice picture, thanks.

PAUL'S POP MUSIC HALL OF FAME

Tuesday, July 2, 2013
Nominees from Pre-1955 - Rosemary Clooney
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. Like many of her peers in the so-called "girl singer" movement -- Doris Day, Kay Starr, Peggy Lee, Patti Page, et al. -- Clooney's style was grounded in jazz, particularly big-band swing. She wasn't an improviser or a technical virtuoso, and lacked the training to stand on an equal footing with the greatest true jazz singers. However, she sang with an effortless, spirited swing, and was everything else a great pop singer of her era should have been. Her phrasing and diction were flawless, and her voice was warm, smooth, and relaxed; moreover, she was a sensitive and emotionally committed interpreter of lyrics. Some of her biggest hits were dialect-filled novelty songs, like her star-making breakthrough "Come On-a My House" from 1951, but she generally preferred to tackle more sophisticated fare, and recorded with numerous duet partners, jazz orchestras, and top-tier arrangers. Changing tastes and various personal problems conspired to stall her career in the '60s, culminating in a nervous breakdown in 1968. However, she mounted a successful comeback in the late '70s, and continued to tour and record for Concord Jazz up until her death from lung cancer in 2002.

Clooney was born May 23, 1928, in Maysville, KY. Her childhood was a difficult one; her father was an alcoholic, and her mother's job required extensive traveling, so Clooney and her siblings were shuffled back and forth between both parents and assorted relatives. When Clooney was 13, her mother remarried and moved to California, taking Clooney's brother Nick (later an actor and TV host) and leaving Rosemary and her younger sister Betty in the care of their father. At first, he supported the girls by working in a defense plant, but his troubles got the better of him, and he abandoned them at the end of World War II.

At first, Clooney and her sister supported themselves by collecting cans and bottles, and entered amateur talent contests as a singing duo (Rosemary had grown up idolizing Billie Holiday). They were saved from poverty (and likely eviction) when they successfully auditioned for a Cincinnati radio station later in 1945.

Billed as the Clooney Sisters, Rosemary and Betty gave weekly radio performances until they were discovered by bandleader Tony Pastor. By the end of 1945, the girls had joined his orchestra as the featured vocal attraction -- which was rapidly becoming a necessity in the postwar era. In 1946, Rosemary cut her first solo record, "I'm Sorry I Didn't Say I'm Sorry (When I Made You Cry Last Night)," but didn't begin to work as a solo artist until 1948, when Betty decided to stop touring with Pastor and return to Cincinnati. Clooney stayed with Pastor for another year before heading to New York in 1949 and signing a solo record contract with Columbia.

Most of Clooney's earliest records for Columbia were children's songs, but in 1951 she began working with producer/A&R man Mitch Miller. As he did with many other artists, Miller pushed Clooney to record novelty numbers, specifically an Italian-dialect song called "Come On-a My House" that had been co-written by Armenian-American cousins William Saroyan and Ross Bagdasarian (the latter would go on to fame as creator of the Chipmunks). Clooney hated the song and held out for weeks before finally giving in. Despite her lifelong distaste for it, "Come On-a My House" was a huge success; it sold over a million copies and topped the charts in 1951, instantly making Clooney a household name.

Over the next few years, Clooney alternated between hot big-band swing and the light novelty fare Miller insisted upon, though she much preferred the former. She was wildly popular in the years leading up to rock & roll, scoring hit after hit: the chart-toppers "Half as Much," "Hey There," and "This Ole House"; the Italian-style tunes "Botch-a-Me (Ba-Ba-Baciani Piccina)" and "Mambo Italiano"; and several other cornerstones of her repertoire, including "Tenderly" and "If Teardrops Were Pennies." In addition, she recorded with the likes of Harry James, Marlene Dietrich (including the hit "Too Old to Cut the Mustard"), Gene Autry ("The Night Before Christmas Song"), Guy Mitchell, George Morgan, and actor José Ferrer, whom she married in 1953 after an abrupt courtship.

Paramount Pictures had decided to groom Clooney for movie stardom, and she made her screen debut in 1953's The Stars Are Singing. She appeared in several more films over the next two years, including Here Come the Girls, Red Garters, and most notably the hugely successful White Christmas, in which she performed the number "Love, You Didn't Do Right by Me." However, acting was not to her taste; instead she concentrated on radio and television, co-hosting a morning radio show with Bing Crosby and landing her own TV variety series in 1956, which ran through the next year. In the meantime, she and Ferrer had five children over the remainder of the '50s, starting with future actor Miguel Ferrer in 1955. Clooney also continued to record, though with diminishing success thanks to the advent of rock & roll. Still, her repertoire was growing more mature, as she recorded with Duke Ellington (the 1956 album Blue Rose) and Benny Goodman, and also tried her hand at country standards and Broadway show tunes. Her final Top Ten hit was 1957's "Mangos," and the following year, she parted ways with Columbia and moved over to RCA, where she debuted with the well-received Bing Crosby collaboration Fancy Meeting You Here. She went on to record for MCA, Reprise, Coral, and Capitol during the '60s as well.

However, the frantic pace of her career, coupled with her suddenly large family, took a heavy toll on Clooney. She became addicted to prescription drugs in the late '50s, and her increasingly stormy relationship with Ferrer ended in divorce in 1961. The two would later patch up their differences and remarry, but they divorced again in 1967. Still suffering from drug problems, Clooney's increasingly fragile mental state (she was later diagnosed with bipolar disorder) took another major blow in 1968, when good friend Bobby Kennedy was assassinated at the Ambassador Hotel just a short distance away from where Clooney was standing. Performing in Reno, NV, not long afterward, Clooney lost her temper on-stage and suffered a nervous breakdown. In its aftermath, she retired from music, and for a time was institutionalized in the psychiatric ward of L.A.'s Mount Sinai Hospital.

Clooney spent much of the '70s in intensive therapy, and was forced to deal with another blow when younger sister Betty died suddenly of a brain aneurysm in 1976. However, she was able to start a comeback that year, thanks to an invitation from Bing Crosby to join him on his 50th anniversary tour. The tour put Clooney back in the public eye, and the following year she published a confessional autobiography, This for Remembrance, and signed a new record deal with Concord Jazz. A steady stream of albums -- usually one per year, occasionally two -- followed all the way through the '90s; in general, they found Clooney in good voice, singing with energy as well as maturity. Most of her repertoire on those albums drew from the great American standards, often focusing on a particular composer or lyricist in the manner of the Ella Fitzgerald songbook series.

During the '90s, Clooney enjoyed a resurgence in popularity thanks to the swing revival that revitalized the careers of veterans like Tony Bennett. While she never considered herself a true jazz singer, her '90s dates sold extremely well among jazz audiences, and her position among the great American pop vocalists was solidified. Additionally, Clooney made several appearances as an Alzheimer's patient on the TV medical drama ER, which co-starred her nephew George Clooney. In 1997, she remarried to longtime companion Dante DiPaolo, whom she'd originally met prior to her romance with José Ferrer; the two had reconnected in 1973 and spent the next 24 years together before tying the knot. Clooney published a second autobiography, Girl Singer, in 1999, and gave what proved to be her last live performance in December 2001. In January, she underwent surgery for lung cancer, and remained hospitalized for several months; she returned to her home in Beverly Hills, where she passed away on June 29, 2002.

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Amazing tough life indeed

Rosemary Clooney: A singer remembered

John Kiesewetter, The Cincinnati Enquirer11:05 a.m. EDT July 15, 2013
New biography explores beloved late jazz singer's life and career.

(Photo: John Kiesewetter, The Cincinnati Enquirer)
How about a dame called Rosemary Clooney?

That's what Bing Crosby said searching for his "White Christmas" female co-star in 1954.

And that's what jazz lovers essentially have said for years, according to the new biography "Late Life Jazz: The Life and Career of Rosemary Clooney" (Oxford University Press; $29.95).

Authors Ken Crossland and Malcolm Macfarlane deliver a thorough analysis of her career and declare: "Rosemary Clooney was arguably the most versatile popular singer in history."

The Maysville, Ky., native, who died in 2002 at age 74, recorded big band, mambo rhythms, rockabilly, country, children's songs, Christmas tunes and novelty hits. She made Billboard's weekly charts 20 times, including four times at No. 1 and another three in the top 10.

Rosemary Clooney dedicated 'We're In The Money' to nephew George Clooney during this 1997 performance at Ault Park with the Blue Wisp Big Band.(Photo: The Cincinnati Enquirer)

"She could schmaltz and schmooze with Crosby in one scene in 'White Christmas,' and become a sultry siren in the next," they wrote.

What other singer, they asked, performed duets with Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett, Perry Como and Cosby; sang with the Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, Count Basie and Nelson Riddle orchestras; and later jazzed it up with John Pizzarelli and Scott Hamilton?

"Late Life Jazz" also details the personal life of Clooney, older sister of broadcaster Nick Clooney and aunt to actor George.

Even readers here may gain new insights from their accounts of Rosemary singing at age 3 in Maysville; debuting at 16 with younger sister Betty (13) on WLW-AM in 1945; touring with the Tony Pastor Band; starring with Tony Bennett on TV's "Songs for Sale" (1950); marrying actor Jose Ferrer; and living on Beverly Hills' famous North Roxbury Drive by Jack Benny, Lucille Ball, Ira Gershwin, James Stewart, and later Peter Falk and Diane Keaton.

The biographers also detail her depression and descent into drug abuse after being in the Ambassador Hotel when Robert Kennedy was assassinated in 1968, and her triumphant comeback in the 1970s touring with old pal Bing and releasing Concord jazz albums.

Very early on, Clooney caught the ear of music critics. "Sooner or Later," from her first recording session with Pastor in 1946, was called "the nearest thing to Ella Fitzgerald that we've ever heard," wrote a reviewer.

The book's impressive indexes list all guests for her national TV variety series (1956-58), but her vocal career clearly takes center stage in the 323-page book.

The authors devoted more pages to her "Blue Rose" album with Ellington and Billy Stayhorn in 1956 than to filming "White Christmas" with Crosby, Danny Kaye and Norwood native Vera-Ellen (Rohe).

Recording with Ellington, the "girl singer" from Maysville said, "validated me as an American singer. My work would not fade with my generation."

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Nice artical, thanks for the find

My work would not fade with my generation.

I liked the last sentence too

 Rosemary Clooney: ‘Late Life Jazz,’ by Ken Crossland and Malcolm Macfarlane

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For years, I kept a telephone message I received in 1996. “Matt,” a warm, hearty voice said, “this is Rosemary Clooney.”



I was one of hundreds of reporters who interviewed Clooney during her long career as a singer, actress and TV host, and what I remember most about her is the easygoing, almost maternal familiarity that she could inspire, even in a phone call.



By the time I talked to Clooney, she was well into the second half of her career, which Ken Crossland and Malcolm Macfarlane allude to in the title of their new biography, “Late Life Jazz.” At one point, though, you could have called her America’s Sweetheart. She was a clear-voiced pop singer with four No. 1 hits in the early 1950s, the host of TV shows and the co-star of the popular film “White Christmas.” Her career hit bottom in the 1960s, and she struggled to overcome a decade-long addiction to pills. She eventually became better known as George Clooney’s aunt than as a celebrity once so famous that she was on the cover of Time magazine.

Before her death at 74 in 2002, she enjoyed a renaissance as a jazz-oriented singer of classic American songs. All the ingredients are present for a remarkable tale of perseverance, resilience and self-reliance, but that is not the story you will find in “Late Life Jazz.” Crossland and Macfarlane are two British researchers — I hesitate to call them writers — who compiled an earlier book on another singer from the 1950s, Perry Como. They have listened to all of Clooney’s records, watched every TV show, noted each visit to a studio and interviewed seemingly everyone who knew her. They’ve done everything, in fact, except shape that mass of information into a coherent biography.



Clooney was born in Maysville, Ky., in 1928, three months before her parents were married. She and her sister, Betty, and a brother, Nick — George’s father — grew up mostly with their grandparents and other relatives. Rosemary was 17 and her sister 14 when they began singing on radio and with a band in Cincinnati. In 1949, Rosemary signed with Columbia Records and launched her solo career under the direction of record producer Mitch Miller — the same Mitch Miller who later had a sing-along television show.



He guided Clooney toward a series of novelty songs that she hated, including “Come On-a My House,” co-written by the author William Saroyan. When Clooney balked at singing it, Miller said, “Let me put it this way. You show up tomorrow, or you’re fired.”



“Come On-a My House” spent eight weeks at No. 1 in 1951 and was Clooney’s biggest hit.



In 1953, she married Oscar-winning actor Jose Ferrer and settled in the same Beverly Hills house where George Gershwin had written his final songs. She had five children in five years, all the while being the host of two TV variety shows. But marital and financial strains soon emerged, and in 1961 Clooney filed for divorce. “Rosemary was now a single parent with five young children aged from two to seven,” Crossland and Macfarlane write. “She was in debt and facing the need to take every booking she could to pay her way.”



But instead of exploring the emotional upheaval of a fading star, the authors inexplicably introduce an unrelated subject with the next sentence: “There was also a new complication and interest in her life: politics.” This ham-handed approach is typical of Crossland and Macfarlane, who quote from dozens of moldy reviews, tell us the curtain times of a British tour in 1955 and include more than 100 pages of appendixes detailing each recording and TV appearance Clooney made. The authors have the bizarre ability to catalogue every tree without noticing the forest. We learn that Edward Everett Horton and Paula Kelly were guests on Clooney’s TV show on Oct. 10, 1957, but nowhere do Crossland and Macfarlane clearly state that Clooney and Ferrer were married and divorced two times.



They also have no ear for music. One paragraph from the Time cover story of Feb. 23, 1953 — a date I learned from Google, not from a book that purports to be a biography of Clooney — tells us more about her singing than we learn in this entire book: “The Clooney voice is known to the trade as both ‘barrelhouse’ and blue, i.e., robust and fresh, with an undercurrent of seductiveness. It can spin out a slow tune with almost cello-like evenness, or take on a raucous bite in a fast rhythm. In a melancholy mood, it has a cinnamon flavor that tends to remind fans of happier days gone by — or soon to come.”



Crossland and Macfarlane are blinded by the stage lights and cannot convey the human sorrows, struggles and triumphs that breathed life into Rosemary Clooney’s ever-evolving art. When I asked her in 1996 what her secret was, she said simply, “I sing from the point of view of a 68-year-old woman.”





Matt Schudel, a Washington Post staff writer, often writes about jazz.





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Great cover
Well done

Thank you Nicky for that loving article. You can tell that this writer not only knew Rosemary and her life story but thought of her as a complete person. You can see that he had great fondness and respect for her. I sense a tone of annoyance from him about the ones that are writing another biography without any emotion or caring for Rosemary. She went through so much and came out the other side a winner.

Yes agree. the writer from the artical wrote so well and you could feel the respect he still has for her.

These two pictures are from the above article "Tenderly" they where so nice that I had to put them up. The one where Nick has his hand on his chest reminded me of George, he often has his hand up like that or around his waistline area.

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