November 8: Patti Page - "(How Much Is That) Doggie In the Window," "Tennessee Waltz" - was born on this date in 1927...

 

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... she died on January  1, 2013 in in Encinitas, California at the age of 85.

Born Clara Ann Fowler in Claremore, Oklahoma, Patti Page was the best-selling female artist of the 1950s. Known as "The Singin' Rage; Miss Patti Page, she recorded 50 albums, including 14 platinum records and 19 gold ones. She has sold over 100 million records during her career.

Patti  got her stage name working at radio station KTUL, which had a 15-minute program sponsored by Page Milk Co. The regular Patti Page singer left and was replaced by Fowler.

Page signed with Mercury Records in 1947, and became their first successful female artist, starting with 1948's "Confess.” In 1950, she had her first million-selling single "With My Eyes Wide Open, I'm Dreaming,” and would eventually have 14 additional million-selling singles between 1950 and 1965. Page's signature song, "Tennessee Waltz,” recorded in 1950, was one of the biggest-selling singles of the 20th century, and is also one of the nine official state songs of Tennessee.

"Tennessee Waltz" spent 13 weeks atop the Billboard magazine's Best-Sellers List in 1950. Page had three additional No. 1 hit singles between 1950 and 1953, with "All My Love (Bolero),” "I Went to Your Wedding,” and "(How Much Is That) Doggie in the Window.” Unlike most pop music singers, Page blended the styles of country music into many of her most popular songs. By doing this, many of Page's singles also made the Billboard Country Chart.

In the 1970s, Page shifted towards country music, and she began charting on the country charts, up until 1982. Page is one of the few vocalists who have made the country charts in five separate decades. Even after rock and roll music became popular in the 1950s,

Page was able to sustain her success, continuing to have major hits into the mid-1960s with "Old Cape Cod,” "Allegheny Moon,” "A Poor Man's Roses (Or a Rich Man's Gold),” and "Hush, Hush, Sweet Charlotte.” She teamed with George Jones on "You Never Looked That Good When You Were Mine."

Tennessee Waltz" scored the rare achievement of reaching No. 1 on the pop, country and R&B charts simultaneously and was officially adopted as one of two official songs by the state of Tennessee.

Patti became the first singer to have television programs on all three major networks, including "The Patti Page Show" on ABC. In films, Page co-starred with Burt Lancaster in his Oscar-winning characterization of "Elmer Gantry," and she appeared in "Dondi" with David Janssen and in "Boy's Night Out" with James Garner and Kim Novak.

She also starred on stage in the musical comedy "Annie Get Your Gun." Her death came just a few days after the conclusion of the run of "Flipside: The Patti Page Story," an off-Broadway musical commemorating her life.

In 1997, Patti Page was inducted into the Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame, and In 1998, she won a Grammy for her record "Patti Page Live at Carnegie Hall -the 50th Anniversary Concert."

Patti only stopped touring recently. Suffering from undisclosed health problems, Patti wrote a note to her fans just last year that said, in part, “Although I feel I still have the voice God gave me, physical impairments are preventing me from using that voice as I had for so many years," Page wrote. "It is only He who knows what the future holds."

She will be posthumously honored with a Lifetime Achievement Grammy Award in 2013.

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For more about Patti, visit her Website at -

http://www.misspattipage.com/

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