The DeCastro Sisters
This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page. (Learn how and when to remove these template messages)
|
The DeCastro Sisters | |
---|---|
Background information | |
Origin | Miami |
Genres | |
Years active | 1942–1977, 1988, 1997 |
Labels |
|
Past members | Peggy DeCastro Cherie DeCastro Babette DeCastro Olgita DeCastro Marino |
The DeCastro Sisters were an American
History
The DeCastro Sisters began as a Cuban flavored trio and were protegees of Carmen Miranda. They eventually became more Americanized in their performances and added comedy.
The biggest
The three original DeCastro Sisters — Peggy, Cherie and Babette — were raised in Havana, Cuba,[1] in a family mansion that was seized by Fidel Castro during the Cuban revolution and is now used as the Chinese Embassy. Their mother, Babette Buchanan, was a Chicago-born Ziegfeld Follies showgirl who married the wealthy Cuban aristocrat Juan Fernandez de Castro, owner of a large sugar plantation in the Dominican Republic, where first daughter Peggy was born. De Castro later developed radio and television in Cuba with David Sarnoff, who was often a guest at their home and was also in charge of a planned project under the Batista regime to build a canal through Cuba, which never materialized.[citation needed]
De Castro purchased a co-op apartment at
As their careers progressed their act became more flamboyant,[1] and they worked across the country, including at the Palladium in Hollywood, where they sang with Tito Puente's band and made their first recordings. In 1946, they provided several of the bird and animal voices for Walt Disney's animated Song of the South, including the Oscar-winning "Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah". They appeared on screen with Carmen Miranda and Groucho Marx in the 1947 film Copacabana, the same year that they joined Bob Hope and Cecil B. DeMille on the live premiere broadcast special launching KTLA in Los Angeles, the first telecast west of the Mississippi. The sisters were introduced by Hope and sang "Babalu", which was filmed by a Paramount newsreel cameraman and is the only surviving footage of the original three-hour show.[3]
In 1954, the more Americanized DeCastro Sisters were signed by a small country label, Abbott Records, and their first release featured "It's Love" as the A-side, backed by a
Now major headliners, they shared the bill with Noël Coward when he made his Las Vegas debut at the Desert Inn in 1954, which had one of the most star-studded and publicized opening nights of any show in the town's history.[citation needed] Coward would watch their act every night while waiting to go on himself. They were part of another historic engagement in 1959, when they joined the Las Vegas debuts of George Burns as a solo act and a young singer named Bobby Darin at the Sahara. It was the DeCastros who told Darin that he should record one of the featured songs in his act, "Mack the Knife"; Darin thought it was just a nightclub number, but he later took their advice. [citation needed]
The DeCastro Sisters appeared on most major TV shows including
In 1988, they made a comeback at Vegas World in Las Vegas, Nevada.[1]
In 1997, they were part of KTLA's 50th anniversary broadcast in Los Angeles and headlined at the
Deaths
Babette died of cancer on January 10, 1992.[4] Olgita died of asthma on February 14, 2000. Peggy died of lung cancer on March 6, 2004, in Las Vegas, at the age of 82.[5] Cherie, the only sister to appear on every recording, film, TV and stage appearance, died of pneumonia on March 14, 2010, at the age of 87.[3][6]
References
- ^ ISBN 1-85227-745-9.
- ^ Joel Whitburn, The Billboard Book of Top 40 Hits. 7th edn, 2000
- ^ a b "Cherie DeCastro dies at 87; member of singing trio the DeCastro Sisters". Los Angeles Times. March 23, 2010. Retrieved 2010-04-11.
- ^ Doc Rock. "The Dead Rock Stars Club 1992 – 1993". Thedeadrockstarsclub.com. Retrieved 24 July 2014.
- New York Times. April 21, 2004. Retrieved 2010-04-12.
- New York Times. Retrieved 2010-04-11.
External links
This article's use of external links may not follow Wikipedia's policies or guidelines. (October 2019) |
- Peggy DeCastro Tribute
- Cherie DeCastro Tribute
- Sun Sus Babae soundie
- DeCastro Sisters biography
- The DeCastro Sisters at IMDb
- Peggy DeCastro obituary
- Peggy DeCastro at IMDb
- Olgita DeCastro Marino obituary
- Olgita DeCastro at IMDb
- Cherie DeCastro obituary
- Cherie DeCastro at IMDb
- Babette DeCastro at IMDb