Mildred Bailey

Mildred Bailey (born Mildred Rinker; February 27, 1907 – December 12, 1951) was a Native American jazz singer during the 1930s, known as "The Queen of Swing", "The Rockin' Chair Lady" and "Mrs. Swing". She recorded the songs "For Sentimental Reasons", "It's So Peaceful in the Country", "Doin' The Uptown Lowdown", "Trust in Me", "Where Are You?", "I Let a Song Go Out of My Heart", "Small Fry", "Please Be Kind", "Darn That Dream", "Rockin' Chair", "Blame It on My Last Affair", and "Says My Heart". She had three records that reached number one on the popular charts.
She grew up on the Coeur d'Alene Reservation in Idaho, where her mother was an enrolled member. The family moved to Spokane, Washington when she was 13. Her younger brothers also became musicians. Her brother, Al Rinker, started to perform as a singer with Bing Crosby in Spokane and became a member of The Rhythm Boys. As adults, Charles Rinker was a lyricist, and Miles Rinker was a clarinet and saxophone player who later became a booking agent.
(Read more at Wikipedia)
== Links To Peel ==
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Peel may well have been aware of Mildred Bailey's work from reading about her in the jazz magazines he subscribed to in his youth, or from hearing tracks by her on the BBC jazz programmes hosted by Humphrey Lyttleton and Peter Clayton; her version of "Thanks For The Memory" was a listener favourite on Radio 3's Jazz Record Requests. She was one of the female singers active in the 1930s and '40s who worked with the top jazz musicians of the era, including vibraphonist and bandleader Red Norvo whom she married. But perhaps because of her early death she was forgotten for a time, until her recordings were reissued in the later decades of the twentieth century. 
Mildred Bailey was also a favourite of Radio 2 presenters Benny Green and Russell Davies, both of them keen on her interpretations of material from what later became known as "The Great American Songbook". JP played a few tracks by the orchestra of her husband Red Norvo, but her only named appearance in a Peel playlist was in 2003, in the Pig's Big 78 slot of his show, on a record Peel had borrowed from his friend Sparrow Harrison. He liked Mildred Bailey's 1938 version of "Weekend Of A Private Secretary" (a song with clever lyrics by Johnny Mercer, sometimes called "the poet of Tin Pan Alley") so much that he said he didn't want to give the record back.
== Plays ==
*16 December 2003 (with Red Norvo): The Weekend of A Private Secretary (78) Vocalion (Pig's Big 78)
== Links ==
*Wikipedia
Category:Artists