Late Life Jazz: The Life and Career of Rosemary Clooney (14 page)

The relationship between Rosemary and Nelson Riddle eventually moved beyond the TV studio although precisely when is a matter of some conjecture. In both of her autobiographies, Rosemary indicates that while there was a “friendship” between the two of them for several years, their affair did not begin until her marriage to Ferrer was over, “at least, emotionally.” In
This for Remembrance
, Riddle is not mentioned by name, reference only made to an anonymous “lover,” but with
Girl Singer
appearing after his death, Rosemary could be more open. She stuck to the story, however, that the affair only began early in the 1960s. Riddle’s biographer, Peter Levinson, offered a different account. The affair, he wrote, began as early as 1957 and lasted for six years. It was “the most intense relationship of their lives, next to their marriages.”
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Will Friedwald, in his study of Sinatra’s relationship with Riddle, quotes Riddle’s son, Christopher, as saying that his father “had a penchant for being swept off his feet by young lady singers,” before adding that the liaison with Rosemary was the exception. It was, he said, “a full-fledged affair that lasted six or seven years.”
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Whatever the length and depth of the relationship, there were complications that would ultimately drive it onto the rocks. Both were married to other partners and Riddle’s wife Doreen was in a delicate mental state following the death of their six-month-old daughter, Lenora, in 1958. Both of their families continued to grow while the affair flourished—the Riddle’s sixth child was born in 1962, around the time that Rosemary was locked into her first set of divorce proceedings with Ferrer. For Rosemary, the apparent ending of her relationship with the father of her five children brought matters to a head. When she and Riddle shared their birthday celebrations in the spring of 1962,
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Rosemary told him that they could not carry on as they had for much longer. Her hope and expectation had been that Riddle would finally divorce Doreen, who by now knew about the affair and was on the point of a full-scale breakdown. Riddle, bothered more by the financial impact of a divorce, said nothing. He later confided in singer Sue Raney that it had taken four days sitting alone in his office before he could get over his decision to end the relationship with Rosemary. “It was the hardest thing I ever did in my whole life,” he said.
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Eventually, Riddle and his wife divorced in 1970. By then, Rosemary had become a different person.

Riddle’s Capitol Records contract prevented him from openly extending his working relationship with Rosemary to the recording studio until she severed her ties with Columbia in 1958, although he nevertheless arranged six singles for her during 1956–57, working under the pseudonym of Joe Seymour.
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When the TV series also spawned a spinoff album, Riddle also provided three more anonymous arrangements. The album’s title was
Ring
Around Rosie
and was a two-thirds/one-third affair. Rosemary had four solo tracks, as did the Hi-Los, with the remaining four tracks featuring them together. With a degree of disappointment designed in for fans of one or the other, the album came up short of what a 12-track presentation of Rosemary and the Hi-Lo’s might have offered. Rosemary’s best solo vocal, couched in an arrangement that bore Riddle’s hallmark, came on “I’m in the Mood for Love,” while “How About You,” sung by Rosemary in a highly seductive voice, was probably the best collaboration.

The end of Rosemary’s Mitch Miller era at Columbia had been more strongly signaled by two other albums that preceded the TV spinout. The albums aligned Rosemary with two legends of jazz, Benny Goodman and Duke Ellington. The Goodman album was issued as part of Columbia’s new “House Party” series of budget priced 10’’ LPs. These retailed at $1.98 and offered six tracks. Three of the six tracks featured vocals by Rosemary, recorded in New York in November 1955, with the remaining tracks featuring Goodman’s sextet. Working with Goodman for the first time, Rosemary approached the project with a mixture of enthusiasm and trepidation. Goodman’s status as a jazz icon was the draw, but his reputation as an eccentric martinet was widely known. In the end they got along fine, although their collaboration was not without its moments. The first run-through of Rosemary’s songs took place at the Ferrer apartment in New York and coincided with her New York nanny’s day off. Baby Miguel was in the playpen when Goodman started running up and down the scales on his clarinet, producing shrieks from the 10-month-old infant at hearing such an unfamiliar sound. When Goodman took it as criticism of his playing, Rosemary laughed at the joke and then realized that he was serious! Her three songs were all Goodman standards. “Goodbye” featured Rosemary and the Goodman sextet; “Memories of You” featured just a trio comprising Goodman, Dick Hyman on piano, and Bobby Donaldson on drums, while “It’s Bad for Me” was sextet plus a vocal contribution from Goodman at the mike with Rosemary. “He couldn’t sing, but he did it with great enthusiasm,” Rosemary recalled.
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Other reviewers were less diplomatic. “Goodman has a great voice for cooling soup,” the
Saturday Review
said.
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Rosemary’s intimate singing—she adopted the hushed intimate style first evident in “Grieving for You”—sat easily with the music, however. All three arrangements were cast in the style of 1930s vocal refrains, each giving Goodman’s clarinet an equal share of microphone time. The album was an appropriate celebration, both of Goodman’s 25th anniversary of his first Columbia record in 1931 and of Rosemary’s first genuine outing as a jazz singer.

Compared to the work Rosemary did with Duke Ellington three months later, the Goodman session was, however, no more than a footnote to her
career. In contrast,
Blue Rose
was one of its defining moments. Examined out of context, the album might appear to be an instance of an up-and-coming singer riding the coattails of a jazz legend and in so doing, catapulting herself into a new dimension for her career. But at the time, it was Rosemary—not Ellington—who was the draw. While she was still riding the crest of her singles wave, Ellington was becalmed. His earlier recording contract with Columbia had expired in 1952, in part because Mitch Miller, who controlled the singles output, was reluctant to give precious singles slots to jazz artists. Moving to Capitol, Ellington released “Satin Doll” as a single. Its success briefly seemed to support his case, although it turned out to be his last single release of any note. By the time of his last session under his Capitol contract in January 1956, Ellington was a ship without a sail.

Back at Columbia, George Avakian, head of its Popular Music Division, had not given up on Ellington. Avakian had played a major role in bringing jazz to the label and in exposing the genre to the new technology of the LP. In particular, he had challenged the notion that the 12’’ long-player should be limited to classical releases, seeing the potential for jazz artists to exploit the longer-running tracks that it could accommodate. Ellington was foremost in his sights, although the route back was a surprise. When Avakian put together a series of LP reissues featuring the work of Bessie Smith from the ’20s, Rosemary approached him and said she would like to do some of the repertoire in an album. “I told her that the incompatibility between the material and her image and voice was too great, whereupon she asked me if Duke would be prepared to do an album with her,” Avakian said.
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To his surprise, Ellington agreed. “I think he appreciated the purity of Rosie’s voice. But he never showed an interest in such a project before. I had once proposed an LP with Sarah Vaughan, which he shrugged off politely. ‘Too busy,’” Avakian said.
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Ellington indeed had never cut an album with any singer not drawn from the ranks of his own band, although there had been individual sides with artists such as Crosby and the Mills Brothers. In the future, other than Rosemary, only Ella Fitzgerald and Frank Sinatra would have the opportunity to record a full album with him.

With the deal done, there was, it seemed, no time to waste in getting the project under way. Avakian enlisted the help of a new producer, Irving Townsend, and the two of them met with Ellington at his Café Society opening in New York on January 12, 1956.
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They agreed that the task of arranging the album should sit with Billy Strayhorn, who had arranged many of the Ellington band’s vocals since joining in 1939. “The thing about that album that got me was everything was in a hurry,” Strayhorn said later. “Duke called me one Friday morning at six o’clock. Told me I had a
reservation on a plane for California Monday. I didn’t find out until I saw him that night that we were going to do this album with Rosemary Clooney.”
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The reason for the trip to California was Rosemary’s second pregnancy. Suffering from what she later called “terminal morning sickness,” she was in no condition to travel to New York, where the Ellington band was committed through the early months of the year. Years later, neither Avakian nor any of the other parties involved could recall why the project couldn’t wait for Rosemary to give birth or the band to turn up on the West Coast. Instead, Avakian came up with a solution that was both novel and technically challenging. Ellington and the band would record the orchestral tracks in New York. Townsend would then take the tapes to Los Angeles where Rosemary would add her vocals. The technique of “overdubbing” had become possible with the advent of recording tape after World War II, but so far it had only been used to correct mistakes or to accommodate gimmicks such as Mitch Miller’s fetish for multitrack vocals. No one before had attempted to score a complete album in that way.

To do it in a jazz setting—arguably the “livest” and most intuitive musical form and normally dependent on the mood and feel of the performers—would probably have been a step too far but for the skill of Strayhorn. Once in California, he spent 10 days with Rosemary in the house on Roxbury Drive. Initially, the two of them worked on the piano in her living room but as her sickness worsened, she spent increasing amounts of time in bed. Strayhorn would sit with her and the two talked endlessly about the album. Finally, Strayhorn had enough knowledge to enable him to return to New York, set the keys, and finalize the arrangements. He scored 13 items for the album, 12 vocals and one orchestral piece. The material he chose encompassed many Ellington standards as well as three lesser-known Ellington-Strayhorn collaborations, “Grievin” and “I’m Checkin’ Out—Goombye” (both from 1939) and “If You Were in My Place” (1938). With Ellington himself at the piano, the band recorded the backing tracks in two New York sessions on January 23 and 27, 1956. Strayhorn’s work was immaculate. “I didn’t know what to expect, picking up one more version of ‘Sophisticated Lady,’” said trumpeter, Clark Terry. “Then I played it, and I told Strayhorn, ‘that chart we just played, man, that arrangement of ‘Sophisticated Lady,’ that is really the most fantastic chart I have heard in a long time.’”
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With the recordings done, Strayhorn and Townsend returned to California where Rosemary was well enough to add her vocals during two sessions on February 8 and 11. Strayhorn’s role as a bridge between two shores was not yet complete, however. The only new song among the 13 was one that Ellington had written especially, which gave the album its name. “Blue Rose” was unusual in that it was a piece written for voice, but without
words, requiring Rosemary to hum and lightly scat along to Ellington’s melody. Such a style was new to her. Strayhorn’s direction was critical. “‘Blue Rose’ is not really a performance piece for you,” he told her. “You are in your room and you are getting ready for a really sensational date. Duke’s band is on the radio on your dressing table. As you’re brushing your hair, you’re singing along with it. That’s the attitude I want.”
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Rosemary’s humming was “superlative,” jazz critic, Will Friedwald, wrote later. “Even without words, Clooney is a better storyteller than most singers who have the benefit of lyrics.”
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On “I’m Checkin’ Out—Goombye,” Strayhorn told her not to sing it angry. Just because you’re leaving the other person, it doesn’t mean you’re mad,” he said. “You’re in charge. You might come back!”
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Strayhorn’s direction, Friedwald wrote, was the key factor in enabling Rosemary to capture the perfect mood throughout the album; defiant but not hostile on “I’m Checkin’ Out”; grieving but not suicidal on “Grievin’”; jubilant but not hysterical on “Hey Baby.”
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Friedwald’s fellow New York critic, Gary Giddins, said that her version of “Grievin’” was “matchless.” “Sophisticated Lady,” he wrote, was “one of the finest versions on record. Clooney’s mastery of tempo gives her the latitude to try any kind of song, but it is through the affective gravity of her voice that she makes them her own.”
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Rosemary herself had no doubt where the credit rested for the album. “It was a work I will never forget,” she said in 1997. “The relationship with Billy was the closest association I ever had with any producer.”
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The album appeared in the shops with a cover that mirrored its production. A smoke-filled image of Ellington, in black and white, sits in the background behind a colorful image of a red-sweatered, red-lipped Rosemary. The separation inherent in the design made sure that America’s mid-’50s convention of physical separation between a black man and a white woman was maintained.
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There were suggestions too that the cover had been designed with a different album title in mind.
Intercontinental
would have emphasized the separation inherent in the way the album had been recorded, although in later years, George Avakian had no recollection of the alternative being given serious consideration.
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The duration of the individual tracks meant that even the greater capacity of the 12’’ microgroove format could only accommodate 11 tracks, 10 Clooney vocals and the one Ellington instrumental. Rosemary’s two missing vocals, “If You Were in My Place” and “Sittin’ and A-Rockin’” appeared on a 45-rpm extended play release before the complete album finally came out on compact disc in 1999.