Georgia Gibbs

Georgia Gibbs

Georgia Gibbs is an American popular singer and vocal entertainer rooted in jazz. Born Frieda Lipschitzin in Worcester, Massachusetts, in 1919, she is the youngest of four children of Russian Jewish immigrant parents. Her father dies when she is six months old, and she spends her first seven years in an orphanage in Worcester, separated from her siblings. She later reunites with her mother, who works as a midwife.

Early career

Gibbs shows an early gift for singing and receives the lead in the orphanage’s annual variety show. She begins professional singing at 13 and performs in Boston’s Raymor Ballroom the following year. Her first recording is made with the Hudson-DeLange Orchestra in 1936. In the late 1930s and 1940s she freelances with the bands of Frankie Trumbauer, Hal Kemp, Tommy Dorsey and Artie Shaw, and works on radio shows including Your Hit Parade, Melody Puzzles and The Tim And Irene Show.

Radio, recordings and chart success

While singing with Artie Shaw’s band, then billed as Fredda Gibson, she scores her first hit with Absent Minded Moon in 1942. She changes her name to Georgia Gibbs in 1943 and becomes a regular on the Camel Caravan radio programme hosted by Jimmy Durante and Garry Moore; it is Moore who gives her the nickname “Her Nibs, Miss Georgia Gibbs”, a reference to her small stature. She remains on the show until 1947.

Gibbs signs with Majestic Records in 1946. Her first hit single arrives in 1950 with If I Knew You Were Coming, I’d Have Baked a Cake on Coral Records. Her biggest success follows in 1952 with Kiss of Fire, which reaches number one on the pop charts. She also charts frequently through the first half of the 1950s, with more than 40 charted songs in total, and is briefly successful with rock and roll material as well.

Style and repertoire

Gibbs has a versatile voice and records material across several styles, including torch songs, rock and roll, jazz, swing, old-fashioned ballads and cha-chas. Her voice is especially associated with romantic ballads and torch songs such as Melancholy Baby, I’ll Be Seeing You, Autumn Leaves and You Keep Coming Back Like a Song. She also performs more forceful jazz numbers including Red Hot Mama and A-Razz-A-Ma-Tazz, and upbeat songs such as Ol Man Mose and Shoo Shoo Baby. Her album Swingin’ With Her Nibbs appears in 1956 and shows her interest in improvisation.

Later work

During the 1950s Gibbs appears on television programmes including The Ed Sullivan Show and hosts her own series, Georgia Gibbs And Her Million Record Show. She is also a featured singer on tours with comedians Danny Kaye and Sid Caesar, and is noted for her comic timing as well as her singing. Her later hits include Dance With Me Henry, her version of Etta James’ The Wallflower, Tweedle Dee, adapted from LaVern Baker’s record, and the novelty song The Hula Hoop Song, which is her last hit in 1958. She records her final album, Call Me, in 1966 and performs only rarely after that.

Death

Georgia Gibbs dies in 2006 at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York.