Norma began her professional career as an adolescent living in Wimbledon, ND, and traveling on weekends to nearby Valley City, where she made her debut on the radio. In 1937 she was invited to audition for WDAY in Fargo, the biggest radio station in North Dakota at the time. She was hired on the spot, but right before she went on the air, the programming director told her that ‘Norma Egstrom’ had to go and christened her with what would become her new professional name: Peggy Lee.
Nationwide popularity and chart-hitting success first came to her in 1941 after being hired as the singer with the Benny Goodman Orchestra. While working with Goodman, she met Dave Barbour, the band’s guitarist and the man who would become her first husband and father to her daughter, Nicki. When Dave was fired from the band for “fraternizing with the girl singer,” Lee gave notice and – looking forward to becoming a full-time wife and mother – announced that she was retiring. Peggy and Dave were married in 1943, and though the marriage only lasted eight years, she considered him to be the love of her life and greatest musical collaborator.
Lee’s “retirement” didn’t last long either, and she found herself once again behind the microphone. She established her solo career by joining the then-emerging Capitol Records and ranks as the female act with the longest stay at that renowned label, her musical alma mater: 24 years. She also spent five very productive years at Decca Records in the 1950s, and recorded albums with several other major and independent labels starting in the mid-1970s. Throughout, Lee continued to work extensively on television, radio and in concert up until the mid 1990s.
Her vast and varied catalog of songs flourished from such longevity in the music business: she recorded more than 1,100 masters and over 50 original albums. Her total number of radio broadcast performances is over 800, and her television appearances surpass the 200-mark.
Best known for such songs as “Fever,” “Why Don’t You Do Right,” “I’m A Woman” and “Is That All There Is?,” she amassed over 100 chart entries beginning with “I Got It Bad” (1941) and culminating, to date, with the posthumous hit “Similau” (2017). Among the myriad music honors bestowed upon Lee are 13 Grammy® Award nominations, a Grammy® win in 1969, and a Lifetime Achievement Award in 1995.
One of the foremothers of the singer-songwriter school, Lee ranks among the most successful female singer-songwriters in the annals of American popular music. She wrote over 200 songs – most often lyrics, but sometimes music as well, with a variety of collaborators, including Harold Arlen, Cy Coleman, Duke Ellington, Quincy Jones, Marian McPartland and Victor Young. Some of the artists who have covered Peggy Lee compositions are Tony Bennett, Nat King Cole, Natalie Cole, Bing Crosby, Doris Day, Ella Fitzgerald, Judy Garland, Diana Krall, Queen Latifah, Barry Manilow, Bette Midler, Janelle Monáe, Nina Simone, Regina Spektor and Sarah Vaughan.
Walt Disney took notice of Peggy’s songwriting ability, and in 1953 he hired her to write all of the original lyrics for his classic animated film, Lady and the Tramp. Walt liked Lee’s song demos so much, he asked her to voice four of the characters, and even named one after her.
Lady and the Tramp was not her only work in film. She appeared in several motion pictures, most notably at Warner Bros. in The Jazz Singer (1952), costarring Danny Thomas, and Pete Kelly’s Blues (1955), which brought her an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress and the Audience Award for Most Promising Female Personality of 1955.
A perennial advocate of artists’ rights, Peggy Lee was quietly standing for this cause as early as the 1940s. In solidarity with the American Federation Musicians’ 1948 record ban, she was among the vocalists under contract who refused to do any recording activity for the entire year.
