Jo Stafford

Jo Elizabeth Stafford (born November 12, 1917) is a singer whose career spanned the late 1920s through the early 1960s. Stafford is greatly admired for the purity of her voice and is considered one of the most versatile vocalists of the era. She is also considered a pioneer of modern musical parody, having won a Grammy Award for Best Comedy Album in 1961 (with husband Paul Weston) for their album "Jonathan and Darlene Edwards in Paris."

Comedy Career

Stafford briefly experimented with comedy under the name Cinderella G. Stump, with Red Ingle and the Natural Seven. True succes in the comedy genre, though, would come about almost accidentally.

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Throughout the 1950s, Stafford and Paul Weston would entertain guests at parties by putting on a skit in which they assumed the identities Jonathan and Darlene Edwards, a bad lounge act. Stafford, as Darlene, would sing off-key in a high pitched voice; Weston, as Jonathan, played an untuned piano off key and with bizarre rythms.

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Finding that she had time left over following a 1957 recording session, Stafford, as a gag, recorded a track as Darlene Edwards. Those who heard bootlegs of the recording responded positively, and later that year, Stafford and Weston recorded an entire album of songs as Jnathan and Darlene, entitled "Jo Stafford and Paul Weston Present: The Original Piano Artistry of Jonathan Edwards, Vocals by Darlene Edwards."

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As a publicity stunt, Stafford and Weston claimed that the Edwardses were a New Jersey lounge act that they had discovered, and denied any personal connection; much time would pass before people realized (and Stafford and Weston admitted) that they were in fact the Edwardses.

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The album was a commercial and critical success. The couple continued releasing Jonathan and Darlene albums, with their 1961 album, "Jonathan and Darlene Edwards in Paris" winning that year's Grammy Award for Best Comedy Album (they "tied" with Bob Hope, as the Grammys decided, in a rare move, to issue two comedy awards that year. Hope was given an award for "Spoken Word Comedy.") It was the only major award that Stafford ever won.

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The couple continued to release Jonathan and Darelene albums for several years, and in 1977 released a final, one-off single, a cover of The Beegees Stayin' Alive. The same year also saw a brief resurgance in the popularity of Jonathan and Darlene albums, when their cover of Carioca was featured as the opening and closing theme to The Kentucky Fried Movie.

Related Topics:
One-off - The Beegees - Stayin' Alive - Carioca - The Kentucky Fried Movie

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Today, the Jonathan and Darlene albums are seen as an important step in musical comedy, and some see them as the predesscessors to parody comedians such as Weird Al.

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