Although she was the epitome of a vocalist during the cool movement of the 1950s, June Christy was a warm, chipper vocalist able to stretch out her impressive voice on bouncy swing tunes and set herself apart from other vocalists with her deceptively simple enunciation. From her time in the Stan Kenton Orchestra she inherited a focus on brassy swing from arranger friends like Pete Rugolo. Rugolo would become a consistent companion far into her solo days, too, arranging most of her LPs and balancing her gymnastic vocal abilities with a series of attentive charts.

Born Shirley Luster in Springfield, Illinois on November 20, 1925, she began singing early on and appeared with a local society band during high school. She moved to Chicago in the early 1940s, changed her name to Sharon Leslie, and sang with a group led by Boyd Raeburn. In 1945, after hearing that Anita O’Day had just left Kenton, she auditioned for the role and got it early that year. Despite an early resemblance to O’Day, the singer -- now renamed June Christy -- soon found her own style. As she became more and more popular with the band, arranger Rugolo began writing charts with her style especially in mind. When Kenton’s band broke up in 1948 Christy worked the nightclub circuit for a while before reuniting with Kenton for his 1950 Innovations in Modern Music Orchestra. She had already debuted as a solo act the year before, recording for Capitol with a group led by her husband, tenor saxophonist Bob Cooper.

Christy's debut album for Capitol Records, 1954's “Something Cool," was recorded with Rugolo at the head of the orchestra. The album launched the vocal cool movement and hit the Top 20 album charts. She recorded a number of concept albums prior to her retirement from the music business in 1965. Christy returned to the studio only once, for 1977's “Impromptu” on the Musicraft label. June Christy passed away in 1990 at the age of 64.

[This article is excerpted from the biography of June Christy written by John Bush for allmusic.com]

Here is a link to June Christy singing on the television program "Playboy's Penthouse" in 1959:

"SOMETHING COOL"