SloaneView Introduction

My name is Carol Sloane and I sing jazz.

I knew I'd be involved with jazz from the time I was a teen-ager. The radio was a major influence. No television in those early days. Radio programs filled our days and nights. Mother listened faithfully to "Breakfast Shows", Kate Smith at high noon ("When the moon comes over the mountain ..."), soap operas Stella Dallas, Our Gal Sunday and Helen Trent, and news commentators Lowell Thomas, Gabriel Heater and H.V. Kaltenborn. In the evenings, we heard Jack Benny, Fibber McGee And Molly, Duffy's Tavern, Allen's Alley hosted by Fred Allen, Bob Hope, The Lux Radio Theatre featuring the voices of familair movie stars, The Lone Ranger, Bob & Ray, The Green Hornet, Edger Bergen And Charlie McCarthy and so many others.

Mostly, the radio stayed tuned to music stations. The popular voices of the day, among them Tony Bennett, Ella Fitzgerald, Vic Damone, Fran Warren, Bing Crosby, The Andrews Sisters, the bands of Benny Goodman, Glenn Miller, Artie Shaw. This was the Swing Era and the music filled the house and the houses of my eight aunts and uncles with all their children. Everyone knew how to jitter-bug, and we all wore socks and saddle shoes.

One day, with idle teenage curiosity, I explored the radio dial, discovering a new station that featured the voices of Sarah Vaughan, Billie Holiday, Carmen McRae, Billy Eckstine, the bands of Count Basie, Jimmie Lunceford, Duke Ellington and Fletcher Henderson. In later years, I'd hear the new sounds of be-bop from my very own radio, a Christmas present I begged for.

The sounds of jazz became the most important entities in my life as I learned the names of the players and singers and the exotic jazz titles such as Ornithology or Straight, No Chaser or Joy Spring; collecting recordings ... these activities filled my days and nights (some disc jockeys broadcast late at night) and my education began. It was thrilling to me. It still is.