Joan Regan , who has died aged 85, was a leading light of the 1950s variety performance circuit whose popular singing style drew on the sunny delivery of her American contemporaries and belied her Essex roots and personal dramas.
During the difficult post-war years, Joan Regan’s uplifting vocal approach had a comforting echo of Vera Lynn’s croon although, with her blonde hair and broad smile her looks mirrored the matinee glamour of the actress Anna Neagle, one of a number of stars she would later impersonate on stage. Success swiftly followed her signing to Decca Records in 1953 when her debut single, Ricochet, found her backed by the Squadronaires, the RAF orchestra. It reached No 8 in the charts and set her on a path that would result in four albums, her own television programme and international touring engagements.
Her first live performance ended prematurely when the curtain came down on her head, knocking her out. She was, however, to become a regular at the London Palladium during the late 1950s and early 1960s, appearing alongside such artists as Max Bygraves, Cliff Richard and Billy Dainty.
In 1946, when she was 18, Joan Regan had married Dick Howell, with whom she had two sons. The marriage was dissolved in 1951, and six years later she married the Palladium’s Box Office Manager, Harry Claff.
One of her frequent collaborators during her early performing years was the pianist Russ Conway. The pair became close friends. Conway declared that “three women taught me about stagecraft: Joan Regan, Gracie Fields and Dorothy Squires.” It proved to be an ideal professional partnership. “Somehow, he and I completely gelled musically,” she explained in 2004. “He took my music away and then we came back and rehearsed. And it was fantastic. It all seemed like different music.”
The variety life was indeed varied for Joan Regan. She entertained Christmas audiences in pantomime with Frankie Vaughan, shared star billing with Beryl Reid, Tommy Cooper and Morecambe and Wise and, in 1955, was called to perform before the Queen for a Royal Command Performance.
Her onstage smile, however, often hid serious distress. Her marriage to Claff ended when her husband was jailed for fraud, a crisis which led to her suffering a nervous breakdown. And in 1984 a brain haemorrhage left her temporarily paralysed and speechless. Miming to her favourite numbers aided her therapy.
Joan Regan was born on January 19 1928, at Romford, Essex. She was talent spotted by the impresario Bernard Delfont, brother of Lew and Leslie Grade, who helped her get signed by Decca (where she recorded two albums, The Girl Next Door and Just Joan). The label shaped her trademark renditions of stateside standards by Doris Day and Teresa Brewer. She later moved to EMI and then to Pye Records.
She sang on the hit television music show 6.5 Special leading to her own programme, Be My Guest. This ran for four series and attempted to expand her act, and her audience, by combining songs with impressions of stars like Gracie Fields and Judy Garland.
Further television work took her to America and across Europe, where she often sang alongside home-grown stars such as Maurice Chevalier, Eddie Fisher, Perry Como and Johnnie Ray.
After her convalescence from neurosurgery in the 1980s, she was encouraged back onto the stage by her old friend Russ Conway. Her late career on the nostalgia tours of Britain’s regional theatres drew fans that had remained with her for over four decades.
These concerts saw her expand her setlist to include numbers by many of her old friends. In particular, her vocal similarity to Vera Lynn allowed her to step into the shoes of the “Forces sweetheart” for celebratory medleys on anniversaries of V-E Day with the support of the Glenn Miller Orchestra. She performed many of her concerts towards the end of her career in aid of various charities.
Joan Regan remarried in 1968, to Martin Cowan, a doctor, and moved to Florida. The couple later returned to Britain and settled in Kent. Her husband predeceased her, and she is survived by her two sons and by a daughter of her second marriage.
Joan Regan, born January 19 1928, died September 12 2013
No comments:
Post a Comment