Sarah Vaughan Sing "The Shadow of Your Smile"

In 1946, Sarah Vaughan's manager and later her husband George Treadwell fashioned her repertoire and stage appearance into the classy performer we came to know and love. Thanks to his guidance, Vaughan had considerable success on the growing media of television and records throughout the 1940's and 1960's. Although her contralto voice with that throbbing vibrato was heard chiefly on easy listening records of the era, Vaughan always remained a jazz musician at heart, recording infrequently but greater verve with artists such as Miles Davis and Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker. Her record career began with Columbia from 1949 to 1954 before moving on to Mercury where she had a greater freedom in material to record and with whom to record. She enjoyed great success with an album in 1958 titled "Broken-Hearted Melody," combining the ballad albums with those teaming her up with some of the biggest names in jazz: Cannonball Adderly, Clifford Brown, and the members of the Count Basie orchestra. This trend in her career extended to a return to Columbia where she stayed from 1960 to 1967.

A fine example of Sarah Vaughan's artistry with a pop song done with a jazz musician's grasp of the melodic line and lyrics is "The Shadow of Your Smile" written by Johnny Mandel for his big film "The Sandpiper." An interesting by-line is that this song became the most requested item at weddings.