Contact Addresses
We welcome queries. For anything pertaining to Peggy Lee data, please contact me at ivansantiagomercado@earthlink.net
For questions and comments about Brian (the free computer database used to create this online discography), please contact webmaster Steve Albin at steve@jazzdiscography.com
For links to other online discographies created by Brian, please visit the JazzDiscography web page.
Acknowledgments
A list of acknowledgments will be provided in the future, once the main pages of this discography have been completed. Estimated date: second half of 2010.
A Work In Progress
This sessionography is still under construction. I have completed the studio sessions, but still have to work on other pages.
Currently I am in the process of finishing the discography's Miscellanea section. That section consists of the following three listings:
1. various-artists compilations in which Peggy Lee tracks can be found.
2. British editions of Peggy Lee's American issues.
3. foreign versions of Peggy Lee's American (and British) recordings.
Afterwards, I will be working on the pages dedicated to Lee's rehearsals and media performances (radio broadcasts, television appearances, live concerts, film soundtracks, theatre work).
Lists Of CDs, LPs, 78s, 45s, Etc.
At the present time, LPs and CDs are not indexed in this discography. I will soon be supplying such indexes, however.
Photos Of Original Albums
Album photos are not part of this sessionography. Readers interested in LP and CD photographies are encouraged to copy and paste the following links:
http://www.peggylee.com/gallery/lpcover.html
http://www.peggylee.com/new/newpeg.html
http://www.peggylee.com/gallery/gallery2.html
http://www.peggylee.com/gallery/gallery1.html
How Many Songs Were Recorded By Peggy Lee?
Here's the answer to a trivia question that visitors of this site have asked: Peggy Lee recorded approximately 1,100 masters. That estimate includes only songs that she did in the recording studio, and which were meant chiefly for commercial release or radio transcription programming.
Besides those approximately 1,100 masters, there are hundreds of Peggy Lee performances extant from various media sources (radio, television, film). Also extant are taped rehearsals and concerts.
Peggy Lee's obituary notices inaccurately reported that the singer had made between 600 and 750 recordings. Such erroneous estimates were probably based on outdated promotional material, going back to the late 1970s.
Erroneous, Non-Existent, Or Unconfirmed Recordings By Peggy Lee
I have included in this discography every single studio recording whose existence can be verified through audio releases and through record company files. As previously mentioned, the number of studio recordings (media performances excluded) comes to around one thousand one hundred. Reports of a few other studio recordings have proven erroneous in some cases, inconclusive in others. Such reports are itemized in the remainder of this long note.
I. Photos of Peggy Lee appear on the covers of over 65 pieces of sheet music. For a few of them, there is no evidence that Lee recorded the song in question. To wit: "Little Fool" (written by Lee for a newspaper contest in the early 1940s, while she was the vocalist with Benny Goodman's Band), "Willow Road" (written by Mel Tormé and Robert Wells, copyrighted 1946), "Look Up" (circa 1948), "La Cucaracha" (Lee is one of various artists pictured on the cover of this sheet, which describes itself as a "celebrity photo edition," and identifies her as a "Chesterfied Supper Club Star," thereby alluding to her 1949 radio appearances), "The New Look," (written circa 1950 by Barclay Allen, Roc Hillman, and Ide Barney), "Hush-a-Bye" and "Living The Life I Love" (both from the 1953 movie The Jazz Singer, where they are performed by Lee's co-star, Danny Thomas), and "One Beating a Day" (written by Lee, and recorded by her on demo, 1983, but not commercially released).
II. The computerized information system Muze lists Peggy Lee among the singers heard in Ladies Sings The Blues, a various-artists issue on the label Bella Musica (catalogue number 89940, compact disc and cassette). The Muze database gives the impression that Lee is heard singing renditions of "Them There Eyes," "Say It Isn't So," "Hey, Buddy Bolden," and "Tenderly." She is not. Lee is heard on "Them There Eyes" only. An inspection of the actual CD shows that the blame for this error lies partially with Bella Musica, partially with Muze: because the Bella Musica CD identifies "Them There Eyes" as sung by Lee but does not identify the singers of the three numbers that follow, Muze apparently took for granted that all four numbers were Lee interpretations.
III. A Capitol master tape misidentifies Peggy Lee as the singer of a performance of "Darn That Dream," recorded ca. December 31, 1947. For more details, see Masters And Songs note near the end of this discography's 1946-1947 Capitol page.
IV. A December 27, 1952 article in The New York World Telegram states that "Miss Lee recently linked her lyrics to Victor Young's melodying for the soon-to-be-released Goodbye, My Love." Though the song is indeed known to have been written around that year, no traces of a recording by Lee can be found in either the Decca or Capitol files -- not until July 26, 1966, when Lee did record the song, for Capitol.
V. "Look!" (master #20-5500) is a 1953 RCA Victor single erroneously attributed to Peggy Lee in an otherwise reliable two-page Peggy Lee Discography by Gino Falzarano, (DISCoveries, July/August 1988). The performer is Kenny Lee instead.
VI. In his 60 Years Of Recorded Jazz (1978-82), Walter Bruyninckx lists "Lonely Town" (master #31805) among the vocals that Lee recorded with George Shearing, shortly after their joint performance at a Miami Disc-Jockey Convention (May 28-30, 1959). However, no such song title is shown in the Capitol sheets that I have consulted. The sheets give master #31805 to another Lee-Shearing performance ("Nobody's Heart"). I do not have a definite explanation for this discrepancy between the Bruyninckx text and the Capitol sheets, but I can offer two hypothetical scenarios. First scenario: at the Miami convention concert, Peggy Lee and George Shearing might have recorded a song bearing the title "Lonely Town" (presumably, the piece by Bernstein, Comden and Green), but their performance was lost or erased due to the concert tapes' audio quality, which is known to be very poor. Second scenario: Bruyninckx or his source might have consulted some old paperwork filed by someone who did not know the title of one of the songs recorded. This person would have assumed that the song in question was titled "Lonely Town" because its first chorus ends with those two words ("Let me sigh, let me cry when I'm blue, let me go 'way from this lonely town"). The song's correct title is, instead, "Blue Prelude." I am inclined to think that the second scenario is the one that actually happened. If so, an additional error was made at some point by someone (else): Bruyninckx's text lists not only "Lonely Town" (as master #31805) but also "Blue Prelude" (as master #31806). In other words, the same performance is erroneously listed under two consecutive masters.
VII. Bruyninckx also lists a Lee performance of "What Child Is This?," master #25054, released in a Capitol album with catalogue number (S)T 2979. The album's title is The Best Of Christmas. I have not been able to inspect any copies of the album, but I do know that it includes a different Peggy Lee performance: "I Like A Sleigh Ride (Jingle Bells)" (master #34022). I do not believe that Peggy Lee ever recorded the song "What Child Is This?;" no such title is listed in Capitol's official session sheets, nor anywhere else. My assumption is that Bruyninckx (or his source) erroneously attributed another singer's recording to Lee. The master number that Bruyninckx is also wrong: #25054 belongs to a recording of "White Christmas" by Al Martino.
VIII. Also seemingly erroneous are notices that Peggy Lee lent her voice to a Bing Crosby recording of "We Wish You A Merry Christmas." One source claims that it is a track from Crosby's 1962 Warner Brothers album I Wish You A Merry Christmas. Another source contends that it is part of Crosby's 1963 recordings on the Reprise label.
IX. According to Marc Elliot's book Cary Grant: A Biography, the legendary actor "signed a contract with Columbia [in 1967] to make a Christmas album of readings from classic material with Peggy Lee singing backgrounds." No such album by Grant was ever made, and the plan to have Lee participate as a background vocalist is news to me. Such a plan must have needed permission from Capitol, which might have been unwilling to lend an artist under contract to another label. (Or, if no permission were to be asked, Lee's vocals would have needed to remain uncredited). Grant did go to the studio, though not to do a full album. He recorded just a trio of songs for possible release on a charity single. All three chosen numbers had been written by Lee, a friend of Grant's who was also present at the recording session. I have not heard Grant's performances, but I have been told that Lee is not audible in any of the them.
X. I once received preliminary information about a Capitol master tape whose label listed "Please, Don't Go" among its songs. At the time, the tape had not been further inspected or played, and I was left with the assumption that this was an unissued and hitherto undocumented performance from the 1960s. (In 1968, Sammy Davis, Jr. recorded a song with that title, composed by David Cohen, for Reprise.) Nonetheless, the preliminary date proved to be no more than a case of mistaken identity. The song is "Please, Don't Rush Me" (recorded March 29, 1962), mislabeled as "Please, Don't Go" in the tape's label.
XI. During an interview conducted by Leonard Feather and published by Los Angeles Times on February 19, 1978, Peggy Lee complained about "a team of producers I worked with who spent a great deal of what was supposed to be our working time lying around in the sun in the South of France - and all the expense involved had to be charged against my royalties. It wound up being nothing but a costly demo, which in effect I paid for." Lee appears to be alluding to a batch of recordings that was left unreleased, and perhaps even unfinished. Nothing else is known about this "costly demo."
XII. In another Los Angeles Times interview, published on December 31, 1983, Feather stated that "[t]he year ahead will also find Lee back in the recording studios. She has talked to two major companies, but chances are that she will sign with a new organization more specifically aimed at the classic pop market." Lee is then quoted as saying that "the company is Applause Records, and if I go with them, I'm planning to have Artie Butler as my producer. I'm collecting songs right now; I have some wonderful things by a writer who's new to me, Bill Gable." Nothing else is known about this project, which is not presumed to have come to fruition.
XIII. For a January 31, 1988 New York Times article, Stephen Holden wrote that Lee "has plans to record four albums for two different companies, including one live at the Ballroom. One of the others will concentrate on vintage blues songs of the Bessie Smith era." The prospective blues album must have evolved into Miss Peggy Lee Sings The Blues (recorded for MusicMasters on February 1988). The plan to release a live date from The Ballroom was apparently abandoned. Nothing else is known about the two other albums that were contemplated. In another interview, conducted by Stephen M. Silverman, and published by The New York Post on February 2, 1988, the prospective recording labels are identified as Hermitage (a New York-based "classical house about to launch a jazz arm") and Pro-Arte (a Canadian-based label).
XIV. In his article from January 31, 1988, Holden also mentioned that Mike Nichols had hired Lee to record a vocal for the movie soundtrack of Biloxi Blues. There is no evidence that Lee's vocal was ever attempted. For further details, see final note for Film page, once that page opens for viewing.
XV. Shortly after MusicMasters' 1990 release of There'll Be Another Spring: The Peggy Lee Songbook, Volume 1, various newspaper and magazine articles reported tentative plans for a second volume (which would have been dedicated to songs co-written with Dave Barbour, and would have included new performances of "It's A Good Day" and "Mañana," among others). Lee's hopes for even a third volume were also mentioned. Only the first volume ever materialized.
In a marginally related note, here are the titles of other planned Peggy Lee albums that did not materialize -- not at least under the following names: Peggy Lee Sings Peggy Lee, Peggy Lee Sings The Cabaret Songs Of Leiber & Stoller, and Bossa Nova Ala Lee. (For further details about those albums, see notes under sessions dated May 27, 1975; May 21, 1966; and February 1, 1963.)
XVI. In an interview conducted at an unspecified time in the late 1980s, Peggy Lee and radio broadcaster Fred Hall talked about the unrealized plans to make a piano-and-vocal album that she and Mel Powell had recently had. A celebrated pianist with whom she had worked during her Benny Goodman days, Powell had remained friends with Lee over the decades. During the interview, Lee mused that, whenever the two of them found one another and a piano was nearby, they couldn't help but play together. She declared herself uncertain about the reasons why the project had not yet come to happen, and admiringly enthused about Powell's gifts as a musician. According to Hall, who was apparently involved in the album's proposal (along with Lincoln Mayorga), the project did not proceed because Lee's manager at the time insisted that what the singer needed to do next was not a piano but an orchestral album. (It would seem that the 1990 There'll Be Another Spring was such an album.) In this very interview, Lee also remarked that she considered a piano-and-vocal album the next logical step in her recording career.
XVII. Around 1993, in an extensive interview with Alan Dell, Peggy Lee mentioned that she and André Previn were planning to record an album together, possibly over the summer of that year, perhaps using Lee's own house as a recording facility. Although Dell expressed doubt about the possibility that an arthritic Previn could still play the piano, at that time (1993) Previn was still recording instrumental albums for Capitol's classical label Angel, on which Lee's CD Love Held Lightly was actually released, that same year. Hence the planned pairing of Previn and Lee would have been feasible. Nothing else is known about the outcome, if any, of those plans.