History, it’s said, is written by the winners. That may be true when it comes to the first or even second draft, but the editing process—which never ends—ensures that, in time, a fuller truth eventually emerges. The simple facts are that we, as a people, look back in an effort to better contextualize the present and that, as a result, each succeeding generation applies turpentine to remove the whitewash applied by the “victors.” The process can be a bit discombobulating for those long accustomed to certain “truths,” but que sera, sera.
The process becomes even more messy when it comes to pop culture, primarily due to the built-in generational prejudices the young often have for the music of long ago. Many are quick to dismiss as kitsch or non-consequential the popular music of the pre-rock & roll era, when bobbysoxers, big bands and jukeboxes—not to mention Jim Crow—held much sway. Yet the songs and performances from those days have much to offer. At their worst, they act as audio evidence of what their specific eras were like. At their best, they transcend their times by speaking to the universality of the human experience.
To that end, Steve Bergsman’s All I Want Is Loving You: Popular Female Singers of the 1950s is an excellent survey of the distaff singers who populated the pop charts during the decade, including—and I’m just naming a handful—Teresa Brewer, Joni James, Kitty Kallen, Debbie Reynolds, Doris Day, Peggy Lee, Gale Storm and Bonnie Guitar. Some of the artists benefited from the era’s segregation, releasing reworked renditions of songs that were originally recorded by black artists. Etta James, for instance, talks about how Georgia Gibbs’ “Suzy Creamcheese version” of “The Wallflower (Roll With Me, Henry),” which was retitled “Dance With Me Henry (Wallflower),” became a million seller and led to Gibbs appearing on The Ed Sullivan Show. (A thorough accounting of black women singers in the ‘50s can be found in Bergsman’s companion volume, What a Difference a Day Makes: Women Who Conquered 1950s Music. I plan to review it in the coming month.) On the flip side, some mainstream artists found success by covering country songs.
I found the book illuminating. I was unfamiliar with Teresa Brewer, for instance, but reading about her led me to check out her Sweet Old-Fashioned Girl compilation album. It’s a lively, entertaining set. Likewise for Joni James, whose “Why Don’t You Believe Me?” is a delight. Bergsman also filled in gaps in my knowledge, especially by explaining the importance that jukeboxes played in furthering a song’s popularity—so much so that Billboard had a specific chart for jukebox plays.
Books like these often lean on the work of others, of course, taking quotes from here and there and sharing contemporaneous reports and reviews. Bergsman goes one step further by talking with several of the principals himself. All I Want Is Loving You is well-written and somewhat of a fast read, though my frequent stops to check out the singers on Apple Music and/or YouTube added several weeks to my time.
The book is available at the usual suspects, including Amazon.
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