A Musical Marriage

During the great Depression which lingered into the late 1930s, having a job as singer with a "Big Band" must have seemed the height of glamour, eclipsed only by the bright lights of Hollywood. In reality, the Big Bands had to be very well-disciplined, in fact regimented, to earn a living from the endless round of touring America, with recording sessions and radio broadcasts thrown in. And if a band settled in any one town for an extended period, it was usually to perform seven days a week and several times a day. The concept for musicians of a normal home life was impossible and no wonder that resort to alcohol or other addictions was common-place. For the female singers, it could be worse, having to put up with both a demanding work load and a mob of male chauvinists who might well regard the job of any ladies in the band to sew on buttons, darn socks, act as maid, and who knows what else - all this and the usually tyrannical demands for perfection from the band leader.