Shirley Luster was born in Springfield, Illinois, and moved with her family to Decatur, Illinois, when she was three years old. She began to sing with the Decatur-based Bill Oetzel Orchestra at thirteen. While attending Decatur High School she appeared with Oetzel and his society band, the Ben Bradley Band, and Bill Madden's Band. After high school she moved to Chicago, changed her name to Sharon Leslie, and sang with a group led by Boyd Raeburn. Later she joined Benny Strong's band. In 1944, Strong's band moved to New York at the same time Christy was quarantined in Chicago with scarlet fever.
In 1945, after hearing that Anita O'Day had left Stan Kenton's Orchestra, she auditioned and was chosen for the role as a vocalist. During this time, she changed her name once again, becoming June Christy.
Her voice produced successful hits such as "Shoo Fly Pie and Apple Pan Dowdy," the million-selling "Tampico" in 1945, and "How High the Moon". "Tampico" was Kenton's biggest-selling record. When the Kenton Band temporarily disbanded in 1948, she sang in nightclubs for a short time, and reunited with the band two years later in 1950.
Beginning Sept. 28, 1959, Christy began a five-week road tour of 38 performances called "Road Show". The all-star billing: Stan Kenton and his orchestra, June Christy, The Four Freshmen. Capitol recorded highlights on October 10 at Purdue University in Lafayette, Indiana, for a two-disc LP, reissued in 1991 on CD.
From 1947, she started to work on her own records, primarily with arranger and bandleader Pete Rugolo. In 1954, she released a 10" LP entitled Something Cool, recorded with Rugolo and his orchestra, a gathering of notable Los Angeles jazz musicians that included her husband, multi-instrumentalist Bob Cooper and alto saxophonist Bud Shank. Something Cool was re-released as a 12" LP in 1955 with additional selections, and then entirely rerecorded in stereo in 1960 with a somewhat different personnel. Christy would later say that the album was "the only thing I've recorded that I'm not unhappy with." Something Cool was also important in launching the vocal cool movement of the 1950s, and it hit the Top 20 Charts, as did her third album, The Misty Miss Christy.
In the 1950s and 1960s, Christy appeared on a number of television programs, including the short-lived CBS show Adventures in Jazz (1949), Eddie Condon's Floor Show (1949), The Jackie Gleason Show (1953), The Tonight Show (1955), The Nat King Cole Show (1957), Stars of Jazz (1958), The Steve Allen Show (1959), The Lively Ones (1963). and The Joey Bishop Show (1967). She also appeared on the first sponsored jazz concert on television, The Timex All-Star Jazz Show I (December 30, 1957), which also featured Louis Armstrong, Carmen McRae, Duke Ellington and Gene Krupa.
Christy embarked on dozens of concert tours, playing in Europe, South Africa, Australia and Japan. She toured to such an extent that eventually it began taking a toll on her marriage. She began to pull back from touring in the early 1960s.
R.M. Cook and Brian Morton, writers of The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings, appreciated the singer's body of work: "Christy's wholesome but particularly sensuous voice is less an improviser's vehicle than an instrument for long, controlled lines and the shading of a fine vibrato. Her greatest moments—the heartbreaking 'Something Cool' itself, 'Midnight Sun,' 'I Should Care'—are as close to creating definitive interpretations as any singer can come."
Christy semi-retired from the music business in 1969, in part due to her battle with alcoholism.
In 1972, she sang at the Newport Jazz Festival in New York City, where she was reunited with the Kenton Orchestra. She also performed at a handful of jazz festivals during the late 1970s and 1980s, playing with a band of all-star West Coast jazz musicians led by Shorty Rogers, as well as taking part in a number of world tours.
Christy returned to the recording studio in 1977 to record her final solo LP, Impromptu. She recorded an interview for a Paul Cacia produced an album in 1987 called "The Alumni Tribute to Stan Kenton" on the Happy Hour label. A number of other Kenton the alumni-Shorty Rogers, Lee Konitz, Jack Sheldon, among them, plus Mort Sahl - interspersed their tunes with reminiscences of the man and the years on the road.
Christy toured one final time in 1988, again with Shorty Rogers. Her final performance was sharing the stage with Chet Baker.
Christy died at her home in Sherman Oaks, California of kidney failure on June 21, 1990, at the age of 64. Her remains were cremated and scattered off the coast of Marina Del Rey.
Stardust
June Christy Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Steals across the meadows of my heart
High up in the sky the little stars climb
Always reminding me that we're apart
You wander down the lane and far away
Leaving me a song that will not die
Love is now the stardust of yesterday
The music of the years gone by.
Sometimes I wonder, how I spend
The lonely nights
Dreaming of a song
The melody
Haunts my reverie
And I am once again with you
When our love was new
And each kiss an inspiration
But that was long ago
And now my consolation is in the stardust of a song
Besides the garden wall, when stars are bright
You are in my arms
The nightingale
Tells his fairytale
Of paradise, where roses grew
Though I dream in vain
In my heart it will remain
My stardust melody
The memory of love's refrain.
The song starts with the singer acknowledging the purple dusk of twilight time that steals across the meadows of her heart. The imagery of the purple dusk reflects the sense of melancholy and longing in the song. The little stars climb high up in the sky and remind the singer of the distance between her and her lover. The second verse talks about how the singer spends her lonely nights dreaming of a song, haunted by its melody, and transported to a time when her love was new and each kiss was an inspiration. The music serves as a source of consolation, as the singer's love has become stardust, a memory of years gone by.
Line by Line Meaning
And now the purple dusk of twilight time
The sun has set and night is beginning to fall
Steals across the meadows of my heart
It feels as though darkness and sadness are taking over my emotions
High up in the sky the little stars climb
Stars are appearing in the night sky
Always reminding me that we're apart
The presence of the stars is a constant reminder that I am separated from the one I love
You wander down the lane and far away
The person I love has gone far away, leaving me behind
Leaving me a song that will not die
They have left behind a memory that will always be with me
Love is now the stardust of yesterday
The love I once had has become a distant memory
The music of the years gone by
The memories of our love are like a song that is stuck in my head
Sometimes I wonder, how I spend
I often think about how I pass
The lonely nights
My nights are often filled with loneliness
Dreaming of a song
I dream of a memory or a particular song
The melody
The tune or lyrics of the song I am dreaming of
Haunts my reverie
The memory of the song is always present in my thoughts
And I am once again with you
The memory of the song makes me feel as though I am back with the person I love
When our love was new
During the early days of our relationship
And each kiss an inspiration
Every time we kissed, it felt like a new beginning
But that was long ago
Those moments are far in the past
And now my consolation is in the stardust of a song
The only comfort I can find now is in the memory of our love
Besides the garden wall, when stars are bright
In a quiet place under a bright night sky
You are in my arms
I hold the memory of being close to the one I love
The nightingale
A bird associated with love and romance
Tells his fairytale
The bird sings a story of love and fantasy
Of paradise, where roses grew
The bird sings of a place where love and beauty were abundant like blooming roses
Though I dream in vain
Even though I know this place only exists in my mind
In my heart it will remain
This memory will always stay in my heart
My stardust melody
The memories and the song that remind me of our love
The memory of love's refrain
The tune and lyrics that bring back the memory of love
Lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group, Kobalt Music Publishing Ltd.
Written by: CHRISTOPHER GENTRY, JOHN HUTCHINSON DEAN, MATTHEW EVERITT, SIMON IAN WHITE, STUART BLACK
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind