Miss Peggy Lee cast a spell when she sang. She hypnotized, even on television. Lee epitomized cool, but her trademark song, “Fever” is the essence of sizzling sexual heat.
Her jazz sense dazzled Ray Charles, Duke Ellington, and Louis Armstrong. She was the voice of swing, the voice of blues, and she provided four of the voices for Walt Disney’s Lady and the Tramp, whose score she co-wrote.
With interviews with hundreds who knew Lee, acclaimed music journalist James Gavin offers a revealing look at an artist of infinite contradictions and layers.
Lee was a North Dakota prairie girl who became a temptress of enduring mystique. She died in 2002 at the age of eighty-one, but Lee’s fascination has only grown since.
James Gavin’s new book is: Is That All There Is? The Strange Life of Peggy Lee.
