OPEN POST: Manor Music Monday With The Giggly Alma Cogan!

Greetings music slutinos, and welcome to the first Manor Music post for the new year! It's back to work for many of you today - and I know, blech. Myself, I want at least another week off, but, hey, music can be a vacation, right? No, really, it can. Tonight, at the Manor's exclusive "Bush Diver" after-hours bar and taquitoria, DJ Li'l Scratch will be playing just want you need to hear as you start the work week. Something effortlessly light, something to sweep away the drudgery, something with giggles. 

How about "The Girl With A Giggle In Her Voice?" That's what she was dubbed in the early 1950s. Behold the chucklesome Alma Cogan, here in her dressing room just seconds before hitting the stage. She designed all of her fetching costumes, by the way. Never once was she seen in the same outfit twice. 

I'm still trying to wrap my noggin around the fact that she was, for quite a long time, the highest-paid female performer ever in the UK (until the rock era hit), scoring multiple #1 records worldwide. But the more you think about it, the more it starts to make sense. UK audiences had good taste, of course, but they also must have had a very deep desire to be tickled senseless (and really, who wouldn't want that post-WWII?).

In addition to her infectious music, Alma was famous for throwing lavish, booze-filled and surely giggly parties at her sumptuous apartment in Kensington, welcoming a host of celebrity chums, like Noel Coward, Princess Margaret, Audrey Hepburn, Cary Grant and even The Beatles. Fun facts: Paul McCartney first played "Yesterday" on her piano at one of her parties, and John Lennon simply adored her - so much so that they had a torrid affair. She was the celebrity you wanted to party with, go shopping with, hang out with over many cocktails. In other words, she was not unlike Rihanna, our reigning party girl celebutant (sans the make-up empire). 

Her 1958 LP "I Love To Sing" very much earns its title. If you're feeling even the teensiest bit blue, her renditions of "Life Is Just A Bowel Of Cherries" or "Today I Love Everybody" are guaranteed to clear away the cobwebs - and how. Try not to smile when you listen. I dare you.

Sadly, her affair with John Lennon ended when she collapsed on stage in Sweden and died shortly after at age 34 (from misdiagnosed ovarian cancer). John was said to be devastated. But I like to think that she's still out there somewhere - giggling, of course, partying, and singing for one and all (and in multiple languages, since she was multilingual). By all means, raise a toast to Alma today. She'd want you to. Ready for more Alma? Dive into her classic 1965 LP, "Alma," released just before her death, RIGHT HERE!

What are you listening to this week? DJ Li'l Scratch wants to know.
Till next time...purr, bitches, purr! 🐾

Photo Credits: His Master's Voice/EMI Records, Getty Images