5 Great Singers Famous For Other Talents
Hello my vintage lovelies! Today I'm going to tell you about my favorite underrated singers in Hollywood. Actors and Actresses in the golden age of Hollywood were expected to be the full package: singers, dancers, extremely good looking, and great actors. Singing was the easiest of these talents to forge. Any lovely actress could easily have her voice dubbed, and so finding that multi-talented person was a little easier. But every once in awhile, someone would come to prominence who had all four talents. People like Jane Powell, Gene Kelly, Rita Hayworth, and many others were recognized for all aspects of their gifts, but many an actress or actor had an asset that completely eclipsed the other talents that they possessed. There were many fabulous voices in Hollywood that never got the credit that was due to them, so here are some of my favorite underrated singers in Hollywood.
1. Marilyn Monroe
You might be a little confused to see Marilyn on this list when her voice is so famous. But the voice that she is famous for is not what I am showing you! In the fifties when she became a sensation for her beauty, she changed her voice into the breathy way she is famous for singing in. It's weak and wobbly, and although she managed to stay in tune, she sings so soft that it is easy to imagine it being difficult. Her vibrato is an atrocious mousy warble and she never holds a note out the right way. I always just assumed that she had a weak voice and that the only reason she did her own singing was because she was able to stay in tune. That is, until I saw a movie with her in her earliest major role. At first I thought her voice was dubbed, but I looked it up and it was her own voice! It's louder, stronger, and sung with more confidence. Her vibrato is spot on and in whole, her voice is sugary sweet. It is professional singing quality. As the lady in this clip says, that's class. Don't you wish she had kept singing that way?
2. Betty Grable
The reason that Betty Grable is on this list is not because people didn't know she could sing, but that no one seems to realize just how good she really was. She could easily had made it as a singer alone had she not been so attractive. Like Marilyn, her most famous quality was her beauty, so that was what the movies liked to display the most.
3. Mickey Rooney
Even the best singer could be upstaged by Judy's fabulous bell-like voice. That was the case with Mickey Rooney. As you can hear in the clip, he has spot-on phrasing and great vocal quality, but now he is known mostly as a comedian and child actor. His voice is impressive, although not particularly unique like Judy Garland's, so it slipped under the radar. However, when we watch this clip let us all take just a second to appreciate Mickey's voice. Also, I just got excited because even though I had seen this clip before, I never noticed that a young Mel Torme, my favorite, favorite singer ever, played the bandleader until just now.
4. Danny Kaye
Now this one is extremely interesting. Like Betty Grable, it's not that people don't know he could sing, but that no one seems to realize how talented of a singer he was. When people think of Danny Kaye, they think of a dancer and comedian with a fair voice. I believe this is in part because his most famous movie, White Christmas, had him primarily as a dancer. Bing Crosby was supposed to be the singer of the two. His voice was actually almost as good as Crosby's. He could change his voice according to what and how he was singing. A rich, operetic baratone with trilled 'r's was the perfect satire to a silly scene, and, of course, the classic crooner voice for a romantic scene. It has been said that he had perfect pitch.
5. Cary Grant
Now this was a surprise! I had never seen any movie with Cary Grant where he sings, and I had always assumed that he was just a great actor. That's it. But I decided to find out what his voice sounded like anyway. I was really impressed! It wasn't amazing, and it wasn't good enough to be a professional singer, but it did leave me wondering why he didn't sing more often. His voice was similar to Fred Astaire's, except deeper, and not as soft.
So on that note, I hope you've been pleasantly surprised by this post, and have a few new favorite singers. Have a lovely day!
