Julie London sang Cry Me A River several times on TV over the years after she made the song her own in 1956. Written by Arthur Hamilton in 1953 for Ella Fitzgerald to sing in the film Pete Kelly's Blues (1955), the song was dropped in 1954 during production. Cry Me a River was then offered to singer Peggy King, but Mitch Miller, Columbia's head of A&R at the time, didn't like the word "plebeian" in the lyric and nixed it. In 1955, Cry Me a River moved next to Julie London, who had just signed a contract with Liberty Records. She recorded the song that year on her first album, Julie Is Her Name, which was released in 1956 and produced by Bobby Troup, who would become her husband in 1959. [Photo above of Julie London in 1960 presenting Ella Fitzgerald with a copy of The Encyclopedia of Jazz after Fitzgerald won seven different jazz polls for best female singer of the year, with Leonard Feather, the book's author, looking on]
Accompanied only by Barney Kessel on guitar and Ray Leatherwood on bass, the haunting song reached No. 9 on the U.S. pop charts in early '56. London then appeared on The Rosemary Clooney Show in May 1956 to sing the hit and promote the album. She'd sing it again that year as an apparition in the film The Girl Can't Help It, which was released in December 1956. [Photo above of Julie London accepting a gold record for Julie Is Her Name from Si Waronker, co-founder and chairman of Liberty, who signed London as the label's first pop singer and produced many of her albums]
Here's London on The Rosemary Clooney Show singing Cry Me a River, followed by the Hi-Lo's singing I Thought About You...
PS: A happy and safe New Year holiday to all of my readers!
