June Richmond

June Richmond (July 9, 1915 in Chicago, Illinois – August 14, 1962 in Gothenburg, Sweden) was an American jazz singer and actor.

June Richmond
June Richmond on Swedish National Radio
Background information
Born(1915-07-09)July 9, 1915
Chicago, Illinois, United States
DiedAugust 14, 1962(1962-08-14) (aged 47)
Gothenburg, Sweden
GenresJazz
Occupation(s)Singer, actress

June Richmond is considered the first African-American jazz singer who sang regularly in a white band when she appeared in 1938, Jimmy Dorsey's Orchestra. She previously worked at Les Hite in California, and after her time at Dorsey she joined Cab Calloway (1938) and then worked from 1939 to 1942 in Andy Kirk's orchestra. After she left Kirk, she launched a successful career as a soloist; in 1948 she appeared mostly in Europe. She first settled in France, where she sang worked with Henri Renaud, and later in Scandinavia.

Her only recordings under her own name originated in 1951 when she recorded four titles in Stockholm with Svend Asmussen. In 1957 in Paris, she recorded another four numbers with the orchestra of Quincy Jones, "I Gotta Right to Sing the Blues", "Sleep", "Everybody's Doing It" and "Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea". She was also an actor in the 1940s and 1950s, as in the American Reet, Petite, and Gone (1947) and the German Liebe, Jazz und Übermut (1957).

June Richmond died at age 47 of a heart attack.

Discography
  • Cab Calloway, 1938-1939 (Classics)
  • Andy Kirk, 1939-1940, 1943-1949 (Classics)
  • Harold Nicholas, June Richmond, Andy Bey, Jazz in Paris (Gitanes/Universal, 2000)

References
  • Bielefelder Katalog 1988 & 2002
  • Richard Cook & Brian Morton: The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings, 8th Edition, London, Penguin, 2006 ISBN 0-141-02327-9
  • Leonard Feather and Ira Gitler, The Biographical Encyclopedia of Jazz. Oxford/New York, 1999, ISBN 978-0-19-532000-8
  • Will Friedwald: Swinging Voices of America - Ein Kompendium großer Stimmen. Hannibal, St. Andrä-Wördern, 1992. ISBN 3-85445-075-3
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