Jo Stafford Wiki: Salary, Married, Wedding, Spouse, Family
Jo Elizabeth Stafford (November 12, 1917 – July 16, 2008) was an American traditional pop music singer and occasional actress whose career spanned five decades from the late 1930s to the early 1980s. Admired for the purity of her voice, she originally underwent classical training to become an opera singer before following a career in popular music, and by 1955 had achieved more worldwide record sales than any other female artist. Her 1952 song "You Belong to Me" topped the charts in the United States and United Kingdom, the record becoming the first by a female artist to reach number one on the U.K. Singles Chart.Born in Coalinga, California, Stafford made her first musical appearance at age twelve. While still at high school she joined her two older sisters to form a vocal trio named The Stafford Sisters, who enjoyed moderate success on radio and in film. In 1938, while the sisters were part of the cast of Twentieth Century Fox's production of Alexander's Ragtime Band, Stafford met the future members of The Pied Pipers and became the group's lead singer. Bandleader Tommy Dorsey hired them in 1939 to perform backup vocals for his orchestra.In addition to her recordings with the Pied Pipers, Stafford featured in solo performances for Dorsey. After leaving the group in 1944, she recorded a series of pop standards for Capitol Records and Columbia Records. Many of her recordings were backed by the orchestra of Paul Weston. She also performed duets with Gordon MacRae and Frankie Laine. Her work with the United Service Organizations (USO) giving concerts for soldiers during World War II earned her the nickname "G.I. Jo". Starting in 1945, Stafford was a regular host of the National Broadcasting Company (NBC) radio series The Chesterfield Supper Club and later appeared in television specials—including two series called The Jo Stafford Show, in 1954 in the U.S. and in 1961 in the U.K.Stafford married twice: first in 1937 to musician John Huddleston (the couple divorced in 1943); then in 1952 to Paul Weston, with whom she had two children. She and Weston developed a comedy routine in which they assumed the identity of an incompetent lounge act named Jonathan and Darlene Edwards, parodying well-known songs. The act proved popular at parties and among the wider public when the couple released an album as the Edwardses in 1957. In 1961, the album Jonathan and Darlene Edwards in Paris won Stafford her only Grammy Award for Best Comedy Album, and was the first commercially successful parody album. Stafford largely retired as a performer in the mid-1960s, but continued in the music business. She enjoyed a brief resurgence in popularity in the late 1970s when she recorded a cover of the Bee Gees hit, "Stayin' Alive" as Darlene Edwards. In the 1990s she began re-releasing some of her material through Corinthian Records, a label founded by Weston. She died in 2008 in Century City, Los Angeles, and is interred with Weston at Holy Cross Cemetery, Culver Ci
Full Name
Jo Stafford
Net Worth
$15 Million
Date Of Birth
November 12, 1917
Died
July 16, 2008, Century City, California, United States
She was awarded 3 Stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for Recording at 1625 Vine Street; for Radio at 1709 Vine Street; and for Television at 7270 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood, California.
The Pied Pipers went from an octet to a quartet once they began working with the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra in 1939.
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She was a favorite singer of GI's during WWII. Servicemen affectionately called her GI Jo.
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The only Grammy Jo won was as her off-key singing alter-ego Darlene Edwards when she won "Best Comedy Album" in 1960.
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Her parents were Grover Cleveland Stafford and Anna (York) Stafford. The family moved to Long Beach, California when she was young and where she had five years of classical voice training.
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Began her solo career after leaving the Dorsey Orchestra in 1942 with the new Capitol Records label. She later moved to Colubmia Records in 1950 and then back to Capitol in 1961.
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Despite her brief time as a solo artist (she ended her career in the 1960s), she sold more than 25 million records.
Had two children with second husband Paul Weston. Tim became a musician and record producer and Amy a singer.
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From 1944 through 1957, she had 83 records on Billboard's pop music charts as a solo artist.
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1960 Grammy Award winner (as Darlene Edwards) in Best Comedy Performance-Musical category for "Jonathan and Darlene Edwards In Paris" with husband Paul Weston (as Jonathan Edwards).
