Kay Starr was successful in every field of music she tried, jazz, country and pop. But her roots were in jazz, Billie Holiday, considered by many the greatest jazz singer of all time, called Starr "the only white woman who could sing the blues."
She is best remembered for introducing two songs that became #1 hits in the 1950s, "Wheel of Fortune" and "The Rock And Roll Waltz".
Kay Starr was born on a reservation in Dougherty, Oklahoma. Her father, Harry, was a full-blooded Iroquois Indian; her mother, Annie, was of mixed Irish and American Indian heritage. When her father got a job installing water sprinkler systems, the family moved to Dallas, Texas.
While her father worked for the Automatic Sprinkler Company, her mother raised chickens, and Kay used to sing to the chickens in the coop. As a result of the fact that her aunt, Nora, was impressed by her singing, she began to sing at the age of seven on a Dallas radio station, WRR, first in a talent competition where she finished third one week and won every week thereafter, then with her own weekly fifteen minute show. She sang pop and "hillbilly" songs with a piano accompaniment. By the age of ten, she was making $3 a night, a lot of money in the Depression days.
As a result of her father's changing jobs, her family moved to Memphis, Tennessee, and she continued performing on the radio, singing "Western swing music," still mostly a mix of country and pop. It was while she was on the Memphis radio station WMPS that, as a result of misspellings in her fan mail, she and her parents decided to give her the name "Kay Starr". At the age of fifteen, she was chosen to sing with the Joe Venuti orchestra. Venuti had a contract to play in the Peabody Hotel in Memphis which called for his band to feature a girl singer, which he did not have; Venuti's road manager heard her on the radio, and suggested her to Venuti. Because she was still in junior high school, her parents insisted that Venuti take her home no later than midnight.
Although she had brief stints in 1939 with Bob Crosby and Glenn Miller (who hired her in July of that year when his regular singer, Marion Hutton, was sick), she spent most of her next few years with Venuti, until he dissolved his band in 1942. It was, however, with Miller that she cut her first record: "Baby Me"/"Love with a Capital You." It was not a great success, in part because the band played in a key more appropriate for Marion Hutton, which was less suited for Kay's vocal range.
How Deep Is the Ocean
Kay Starr Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
I'll tell you no lie
How deep is the ocean?
How high is the sky?
How many times a day do I think of you?
How many roses are sprinkled with dew?
To be where you are?
How far is the journey
From here to a star?
And if I ever lost you, how much would I cry?
How deep is the ocean?
How high is the sky?
How far would I travel
To be where you are?
How far is the journey
From here to a star?
And if I ever lost you, how much would I cry?
How deep is the ocean?
How high is the sky?
How high is the sky?
In Kay Starr's song How Deep Is the Ocean, the lyrics express the depth of love the singer has for their significant other. The song begins with the singer asking a series of rhetorical questions to convey the intensity of their love for their partner. They ask, "How much do I love you? I'll tell you no lie. How deep is the ocean? How high is the sky?" These questions serve as a metaphor for the depths and heights of their affection towards their partner, and expresses the idea that their love is boundless and eternal.
The singer goes on to express their frequency of thoughts about their partner, asking "How many times a day do I think of you? How many roses are sprinkled with dew?" These questions not only highlight the extent of their love, but also suggest that the singer's love is a constant presence in their life. They then ask, "How far would I travel/To be where you are?/How far is the journey/From here to a star?" The use of the figurative language of distance and travel conveys the idea that the singer will go to great lengths to be with their partner, no matter the physical distance between them.
The song concludes on a poignant note, as the singer asks, "And if I ever lost you, how much would I cry?/How deep is the ocean?/How high is the sky?" These final lines express the idea that the love the singer has for their partner is so profound that the thought of losing them would be unbearable. The use of these rhetorical questions throughout the song emphasizes the limitless depth and scope of the singer's love.
Line by Line Meaning
How much do I love you?
I want to express the depth of my love for you.
I'll tell you no lie
I promise to be truthful about my feelings.
How deep is the ocean?
How infinite is my love for you?
How high is the sky?
Could my love for you reach the unreachable?
How many times a day do I think of you?
You are always on my mind.
How many roses are sprinkled with dew?
My love for you is as natural as the morning dew on the roses.
How far would I travel
I am willing to go to great lengths
To be where you are?
Just to be close to you.
How far is the journey
Is it possible to travel too far for love?
From here to a star?
Even if the future seems unreachable, my love for you is constant.
And if I ever lost you, how much would I cry?
I cannot imagine living without you.
How deep is the ocean?
My love for you is deeper than the deepest ocean.
How high is the sky?
My love for you reaches heights beyond the sky.
How high is the sky?
Could my love for you reach the unreachable?
Lyrics © BMG Rights Management, Universal Music Publishing Group, Songtrust Ave
Written by: Irving Berlin
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
David Walsh
One of the greatest voices around. She had style and class.
Donald Brenner
Before the Righteous Brothers, there were a few artists singing 'blue-eyed soul' - Kay was one of them. Of course, Frankie Laine was the first with That's My Desire and later even with the dopey stuff Mitch Miller gave him, followed by Johnnie Ray with a 2-sided hit on Okeh with Cry/The Little White Cloud that Cried then Kay followed by Timi Yuro and Miss Toni Fisher. What a collection of greats!
Disgruntled Toonbot
I vibe with this
terracite
@tazbri1 Glad you like that song, I first heard it in the mid. '50's, being sung, in a pub by a couple who must have been in their seventies, so just assumed that it must be an old song. I never heard it again until. 50yrs later, looking thro' Kay Starr's discography I spotted that title.and sure enough it was the one, written in the 1950's, and the interesting thing is that one of the co-writers was Donald O'Connor, take care, Ken.
mary briscoe
My party piece.
dane of GHRecords
i really miss her
Sasha Conrad
daneguitarist1 me too.