- Gene Austin
Infobox_Musician
Name =Gene Austin
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Background = Solo_singer
Birth_name = Lemeul Eugene Lucas
Alias =
Born = birth date|1900|6|24|
Origin = Gainesville in Cooke County,Texas , USA
Died = death date and age|1972|1|24|1900|6|24 in Palm Springs,California
Instrument =Piano
Voice_type =
Genre =Jazz Vaudeville
Occupation =Singer Crooner
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Label =RCA
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Past_members =Gene Austin (
June 24 ,1900 –January 24 ,1972 ) was an Americansinger andsongwriter who is considered to have been the first "crooner ".Austin was born as Lemeul Eugene Lucas in
Gainesville, Texas (north of Dallas), to Nova Lucas (died 1943) and the former Serena Belle Harrell (died 1956). He took the name "Gene Austin" from his stepfather, Jim Austin, ablacksmith . Austin grew up in Minden, the seat ofWebster Parish in northwesternLouisiana , located east of Shreveport. There he learned to playpiano andguitar . He ran away from home at fifteen and attended avaudeville act inHouston, Texas , where the audience was allowed to come to the stage and sing. On a dare from his friends, Austin took the stage and sang for the first time since singing as a Southern Baptist choir boy. The audience response was overwhelming, and the vaudeville company immediately offered him a billed spot on their ticket.Austin joined the
U.S. Army at the age of seventeen in hopes of being dispatched toEurope to fight inWorld War I . He was first stationed inNew Orleans , where he played the piano at night in the city's notoriousvice district. His familiarity with horses from helping his stepfather in his blacksmithing business also prompted the Army to assign Austin to thecavalry and send him toMexico with GeneralJohn Pershing 's Pancho Villa expedition, for which he was awarded theMexican Service Medal . Thereafter, he served inFrance in the Great War.On returning to the United States in 1919, Austin settled in
Baltimore, Maryland , where he intended to studydentistry . Soon, however, he was playing piano and singing in localtavern s. He started writing songs and formed a vaudeville act with Roy Bergere, with whom he wrote "How Come You Do Me Like You Do." The act ended when Bergere married.Austin worked briefly in a club owned by Lou Clayton, who later was a part of the famous vaudeville team Clayton, Jackson and Durante.
RCA Victor bought his popular song "When My Sugar Walks Down the Street." In the next decade with RCA, Austin sold over 80 million records -- a total unmatched by a single artist for 40 years. Best sellers included "The Lonesome Road," "Riding Around in the Rain," and "Ramona."Arriving with the advent of electrical recording technologies (earlier, acoustical technologies had been used) Austin soon gave birth to the "crooner" form (a clear light tenor) of singing of the 1920s and 1930s. Along with
Art Gillham ,Nick Lucas , Johnny Marvin andCliff Edwards , Austin took over from the more sentimental style of tenor vocals popularized by such singers asHenry Burr andBilly Murray . Such later crooners asBing Crosby ,Frank Sinatra , andRuss Columbo all credited Austin with creating the musical genre that began their careers. Gene Austin became enormously popular in the late 1920s.His recording of "My Blue Heaven" sold over twelve million records and until
Bing Crosby 's "White Christmas " replaced it as the largest selling record of all time.Offered to work in Hollywood at the height of his career as the "Voice of the Southland", Austin appeared in three films, "
Belle of the Nineties " (1934), "Klondike Annie " (1936) and "My Little Chickadee " (1940), at the request of his personal friend,Mae West .Gene Austin married his first wife, Kathryn Arnold, a dancer, in 1924 and divorced her in 1929. They had a child, Ann, born in 1928. Austin married his second wife, Agnes Antelline, in 1933, and their daughter Charlotte was born that same year. He and Agnes divorced in 1940. Austin then married actress Doris Sherrell in 1940, and divorced her in 1946. He married wife number four, LouCeil Hudson, a singer, in 1949, and the marriage lasted until 1966. Austin married Gigi Theodorea in 1967; this was his fifth and final marriage. Country music star
Tommy Overstreet of the 1970s is Austin'sthird cousin .In 1956,
CBS made a television drama about Austin's life.In 1962, Austin campaigned unsuccessfully for the Democratic nomination for
governor ofNevada . He polled only 5,017 votes (10.21 percent) to his opponent,Grant Sawyer , who received 40,168 ballots (81.4 percent) Sawyer then won the governorship by a nearly 2-1 margin over weak Republican opposition in the fall campaign.Austin had retired to Palm Springs, in the late 1950s and had been active in civic boards there until 1970. Income from his record sales allowed him to live comfortably the rest of his life. He died in Palm Springs of
lung cancer and was interred in the Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery inGlendale, California .In 1978, Gene Austin was posthumously awarded a
Grammy Hall of Fame Award for his 1928 recording of "Bye Bye Blackbird ", which has long been considered recorded music's definitive rendition of that song.In 2005, Gene Austin was nominated and admitted to the
Grammy Hall of Fame . He was a godfather of country singer David Houston, who like Austin also lived in Minden, Louisiana, during his youth.Infobox Person
Name=Gene Austin
spouse = (1) Kathryn Arnold Austin (1924–1929), (2) Agnes Antelline Austin (1933–1940), (3) Doris Sherrell Austin (1940–1946), (4) LouCeil Hudson Austin (1949–1966), (5) Gigi Theodorea Austin (1966–1972)
children = Ann (first marriage), Charlotte (second marriage)
party=Democratic
religion=Baptist References
* "Gene Austin," "A Dictionary of Louisiana Biography", Vol. 1 (1988), p. 25
* "Congressional Quarterly's Guide to U.S. Elections", Nevada gubernatorial primaries
* "The Rise Of The Crooners", Michael Pitts and Frank Hoffman; Scarecrow Press, 2002External links
* [http://www.raeproductions.com/music/railroad.html Audio link for recording of "Got the Railroad Blues" (Realaudio)]
*findagrave|2076 Retrieved on2008-02-10
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