“GI Jo” Stafford
With Jo Stafford gone, World War II and the Big Band era slip further away from living memory. But Jo’s recordings remain. Thanks go to D.F. Rogers for helping me compile this collection.
This Jo Stafford record is from Christmas ‘42, a year after Pearl Harbor…
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The year 1944 was a big one for Jo Stafford. She started it with the Pied Pipers, who recorded one version of the popular novelty tune “Mairzy Doats.”
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Jo left the Pied Pipers to join Johnny Mercer, one of the principals behind Capitol Records, and she sang “Candy” with him.
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Hey, I’m getting better at this. I can tell this is Mercer and not Tex Beneke. Mercer didn’t have the control that Tex, let alone Jo, had.
On D-Day Jo had a song on the charts from the movie “Cover Girl,” called “Long Ago (And Far Away)”…
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In September she could be heard on the radio singing “It Could Happen To You”…
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After the war, Christmas ‘45, when the Baby Boom started, there was “Symphony”…
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And in September ‘46, while those babies were being born, Jo sang “There Is Always”.
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8 comments July 19th, 2008
