Margaret Whiting

A favourite of the American forces during WWII and a fixture on radio and in clubs in the 1940s and '50s, Margaret Whiting was a crystal-voiced singer who performed jazz standards and sentimental ballads and had a successful career that stretched over 60 years. Growing up in a showbusiness family, she was raised in New York where her father Richard A. Whiting was an acclaimed songwriter who composed hits for Broadway and was a contemporary of George Gershwin, before the family moved to Hollywood where he penned movie scores. Her aunt Margaret Young was also a popular singer and her mother managed acts, including bawdy vaudeville entertainer Sophie Tucker, and Margaret naturally started performing at the lavish celebrity parties that her parents regularly held. When her father died in 1938 the performer and composer Johnny Mercer became her mentor and signed her to his Capitol Records label, making her breakthrough at the age of 18 when she recorded 'That Old Black Magic' with the Freddie Slack Orchestra. In 1942 her version of 'Moonlight On Vermont' sold over one million copies and became her signature anthem, and she later topped the Billboard Charts with her single 'A Tree in the Meadow' in 1948. Her version of 'Baby, It's Cold Outside' with Mercer and her duet on 'Silver Bells' with country crooner Jimmy Wakely also became big hits, and she went on to star with her sister Barbara in the CBS television sitcom 'Those Whiting Girls'. A gregarious, larger-than-life figure, she continued to perform with big bands and in variety shows until late into her life, but died peacefully in 2011 at the age of 86.

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