From:   "Dik de Heer" 
Date:  Fri Aug 16, 2002  1:16 am
Subject:  Born To Be With You : Ketty Lester
 
KETTY LESTER

Born Revoyda Frierson, 16 August 1934, Hope, Arkansas

Singer Ketty Lester has a career that spans music, TV, film, and stage.
Her revival of Dick Haynes' 1945 hit "Love Letters" went to # 5 pop and
# 2 R&B on Billboard's charts in the spring of 1962, on the Era label.
The men behind this hit were Ed Cobb (bass singer of the Four Preps,
1956-65) and Lincoln Mayorga (arranger and pianist of the Four Preps),
who were moonlighting as indie producers, cutting jokey rock instrumentals
with the Piltdown Men. Cobb and Mayorga thought they had found the
perfect song for Ketty in "I'm A Fool To Want You", but it was the B-side,
"Love Letters" that caught on with the record buyers. The arrangement,
with a remarkable piano accompaniment by Mayorga, was copied note
for note in 1966 by Elvis A. Presley, who took the song to # 19.
Ketty Lester was one of 15 children born into a farmer's family. After winning
a scholarship in 1955, she moved to California and attended San Francisco
City College, majoring in nursing. Lester sang in church and the school
choir, and performed in summer stock theater. Having failed auditions for
RCA and Columbia, she was working as a demo singer when Cobb and
Mayorga discovered her. The follow-up single to "Love Letters" was a remake
of George Gershwin's "But Not for Me", which peaked at # 41 pop during the
summer of 1962. (If it had climbed one position higher, Wayne Jancik wouldn't
have included her in his book on One-hit wonders).
The LP "Ketty Lester" was issued that same year. It featured two singles,
"You Can't Lie to a Liar" and a cover of Woody Guthrie's "This Land Is Your
Land." After her Era period she recorded for Capitol, Everest, Pete, RCA and
Tower and a Christian album, "I Saw Him", for Mega Records in 1985.
She acted in several movies and TV series (soaps and sitcoms), well into
the nineties.

Beware of the CD "Love Letters" on Collectables. These are not the original
Era recordings, but inferior rerecordings. The original "Love Letters" is
available
on Vol. 3 of "The Golden Age of American Rock 'n' Roll" (Ace 497).