Music: New Records, Jul. 12, 1954

Between 1938 and 1943 the ears of U.S. music lovers bent to one of the most unusual singers they had ever heard. Her name was Elsie Houston; she was born in Brazil; she was the great-great-great-granddaughter of the grandfather of Texas' Sam Houston, and she could trumpet like a fishwife or trill like a bird. On the concert stage (once 22,000 people gathered at Washington's Water Gate to hear her), she divided her program between art songs and Brazilian folk songs. In nightclubs she liked to dim the lights to a pair of candles,...

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