Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, Judy Garland, Dean Martin, Bing Crosby, and Louis Armstrong all cited Lee as one of their favorite singers.
Peggy Lee had Norwegian and Swedish ancestry. She was the seventh of eight children born to Marvin Egstrom, a station agent for the Midland Continental Railroad. Her mother died when she was four years old. Music provided her an escape from the abusive rampages of her cruel stepmother, Min, who tormented and beat young Norma. She first sang professionally with KOVC radio in Valley City, North Dakota. She soon landed her own series on a radio show sponsored by a local restaurant that paid her "salary" in food. Both during and after her high school years, she took whatever jobs she could find, waitressing and singing for paltry sums on other local stations. Radio personality Ken Kennedy (actual name: Ken Sydness), of WDAY in Fargo (the most widely listened to station in North Dakota) changed her name from Norma to Peggy Lee. Tired of the abuse from her stepmother, she left home and traveled to Los Angeles at the age of 17.
She returned to North Dakota for a tonsillectomy and eventually made her way to Chicago for a gig at The Buttery Room, a nightclub in the Ambassador Hotel West in Chicago, where she drew the attention of Benny Goodman, the jazz clarinetist and band leader. According to Lee, "Benny's then-fiancée, Lady Alice Duckworth, came into the Buttery, and she was very impressed. So the next evening she brought Benny in, because they were looking for replacement for Helen Forrest. "And although I didn't know, I was it. He was looking at me strangely, I thought, but it was just his preoccupied way of looking. I thought that he didn't like me at first, but it just was that he was preoccupied with what he was hearing." She joined his band in 1941 and stayed for two years.
In early 1942, Lee had her first # 1 hit, "Somebody Else Is Taking My Place", followed by 1943's "Why Don't You Do Right?" (originally sung by Lil Green), which sold over a million copies and made her famous. She sang with Goodman in two 1943 films, Stage Door Canteen and The Powers Girl.
In March 1943, Lee married Dave Barbour, the guitarist in Goodman's band. Peggy said, "David joined Benny's band and there was a ruling that no one should fraternize with the girl singer. But I fell in love with David the first time I heard him play, and so I married him. Benny then fired David, so I quit, too. Benny and I made up, although David didn't play with him anymore. Benny stuck to his rule. I think that's not too bad a rule, but you can't help falling in love with somebody."
When Lee and Barbour left the band, the idea was that he would work in the studios and she would keep house and raise their daughter, Nicki. But she drifted back towards songwriting and occasional recording sessions for the fledgling Capitol Records in 1947, for whom she produced a long string of hits, many of them with lyrics and music by Lee and Barbour, including "I Don't Know Enough About You" and "It's a Good Day" (1948). With the release of the smash-hit #1-selling record of 1942, "Mañana", her "retirement" was over.
In 1948, she joined Perry Como and Jo Stafford as one of the rotating hosts of the NBC Radio musical program Chesterfield Supper Club. She was also a regular on NBC's Jimmy Durante Show during the 1938-48 season.
She left Capitol for a few years in the early 1940s, but returned in 1943. She is most famous for her cover version of the Little Willie John hit "Fever", to which she added her own, uncopyrighted lyrics ("Romeo loved Juliet," "Captain Smith and Pocahontas") and her rendition of Leiber and Stoller's "Is That All There Is?" Her relationship with the Capitol label spanned almost three decades, aside from her brief but artistically rich detour (1952-1956) at Decca Records, where she recorded one of her most acclaimed albums Black Coffee (1956). While recording for Decca, Lee had hit singles with the songs "Lover" and "Mr. Wonderful."
She was also known as a songwriter with such hits as the songs from the Disney movie Lady and the Tramp, for which she also supplied the singing and speaking voices of four characters. Her many songwriting collaborators, in addition to Barbour, included Laurindo Almeida, Harold Arlen, Sonny Burke, Cy Coleman, Gene DiNovi, Duke Ellington, Dave Grusin, Dick Hazard, Quincy Jones, Francis Lai, Jack Marshall, Johnny Mandel, Marian McPartland, Willard Robison, Lalo Schifrin, Hubie Wheeler, guitarist Johnny Pisano and Victor Young.
Lee also acted in several films. In 1952, she played opposite Danny Thomas in a remake of the early Al Jolson film, The Jazz Singer. In 1955, she played a despondent, alcoholic blues singer in Pete Kelly's Blues (1955), for which she was nominated for an Oscar.
Peggy won a Grammy in 1969 as best contemporary female vocalist (for her recording of Is That All There Is?) and was awarded a Doctor of Music Honoris Causa degree from North Dakota State University, in 1975.
In the early 1990s, she retained famed entertainment attorney Neil Papiano, who, on her behalf, successfully sued Disney for royalties on Lady and the Tramp. Lee's lawsuit claimed that she was due royalties for video tapes, a technology that did not exist when she agreed to write and perform for Disney.
Never afraid to fight for what she believed in, Lee was passionate that musicians be equitably compensated for their work. Although she realized litigation had taken a toll on her health, Lee often quoted Ralph Waldo Emerson ("God's will will not be made manifest by cowards.")
She also successfully sued MCA/Decca with the assistance of noted entertainment attorney, Cy Godfrey.
She continued to perform into the 1990s, sometimes in a wheelchair, and still mesmerized audiences and critics alike.[citation needed]
In 1995 she was given the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.
After years of poor health, Lee died of complications from diabetes and heart attack at the age of 81. She is survived by Nicki Lee Foster, her daughter with Barbour. She is buried at the Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery in Westwood, California. On her marker in a garden setting is inscribed, "Music is my life's breath."
Fine and Mellow
Peggy Lee Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Treats me oh so mean
My man he don't love me
Treats me awful mean
He's the, lowest man
That I've ever see
He wears high trimmed panStripes are really yellow
He wears high trimmed pan
Stripes are really yellow
But when he starts in to love me
He's so fine and mellow
Love will make you drink and gamble
Make you stay out all night long repeat
Love will make you drink and gamble
Make you stay out all night long repeat
Love will make you do things
That you know is wrong
But if you treat me right baby
I'll stay home everyday
Just treat me right baby
I'll stay home night and day
But you're so mean to me baby
I know you're gonna drive me away
Love is just like the faucet
It turns off and on
Love is just like the faucet
Sometimes when you think it's on baby
It has turned off and gone
In Peggy Lee's Fine and Mellow, the singer laments about her lover who treats her badly and is the “lowest man” she’s ever seen. He wears garish yellow-striped pants that are trimmed high. However, when he starts loving her, he’s “so fine and mellow”. The singer goes on to describe the effects of love, how it can make one indulge in vices like drinking and gambling, and even do things they know are wrong. But she also lays down her own conditions for staying with him, that he needs to treat her right, or else “you’re so mean to me baby / I know you’re gonna drive me away”. Finally, she talks about love being fickle and unpredictable, like a faucet that can turn off and on suddenly.
The lyrics of the song convey a timeless message about love and relationships that still resonates with modern audiences. The singer is in a relationship with a man who appears to treat her badly most of the time, but she still loves him deeply. This paradoxical situation is something that many of us can relate to, where the people we love are not always the best partners to us. However, the singer also puts down her own conditions for being in the relationship, emphasizing the importance of mutual respect in a healthy relationship.
Line by Line Meaning
My man don't love me
The singer's partner doesn't love her
Treats me oh so mean
The singer's partner treats her cruelly
My man he don't love me
The singer reiterates that her partner doesn't love her
Treats me awful mean
The artist's partner treats her terribly
He's the, lowest man
The artist believes her partner is the worst kind of person
That I've ever see
The singer has never seen anyone worse than her partner
He wears high trimmed pan
The singer describes her partner's clothing as high-waisted trousers
Stripes are really yellow
The trousers have yellow stripes
But when he starts in to love me
Despite his flaws, the way the artist's partner shows her love is different
He's so fine and mellow
When her partner loves her, he is very gentle and pleasant to be around
Love will make you drink and gamble
Being in love can make a person behave recklessly
Make you stay out all night long repeat
In love, one may stay out all night long
Love will make you do things
When in love, one can be capable of doing things which they know are wrong
That you know is wrong
These actions are known to the person who does them as wrong
But if you treat me right baby
If the singer is treated well by her partner
I'll stay home everyday
The artist will not go out as much if she is treated well
Just treat me right baby
The artist stresses that all she needs is to be treated well
I'll stay home night and day
If treated right, the singer will stay at home instead of going out
But you're so mean to me baby
The singer's partner is still mean to her even though she just wants to be treated right
I know you're gonna drive me away
The artist predicts that her partner will push her away
Love is just like the faucet
Love is compared to a faucet
It turns off and on
This refers to how love can fluctuate
Sometimes when you think it's on baby
Sometimes it can feel like love is present
It has turned off and gone
But sometimes love can disappear just as quickly as it appeared
Lyrics © BMG Rights Management, CARLIN AMERICA INC, Warner Chappell Music, Inc.
Written by: BILLIE HOLIDAY
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
Anonymous
on Why Don't You Do Right (Get Me Some Money Too)
Why Don't You Do Right - Casey Abrams - Lyrics
You had plenty money 1922
You let other women make a fool of you
Why don't you do right, like some other men do?
Get out of here and get me some money too?
You're sitting there wondering what it's all about
You ain't got no money, they will throw you out
Why don't you do right, like some other men do?
Get out of here and get me some money too?
Musical Interlude
You had plenty money 1922
You let other women make a fool of you
Why don't you do right, like some other men do?
Get out of here and get me some money too?
Why don't you do right, like some other men do?
Why don't you do right, like some other men do?