Hildegarde

Liberace once hailed her as the most renowned supper-club performer in history, and indeed the cabaret legend Hildegarde dominated nightclubs on every continent for nearly seventy years while pioneering the now-familiar practice of single-name stardom. Born Hildegarde Loretta Sell on February 1, 1906, in Adell, Wisconsin, to a mother who served as church organist and choir director, she grew up in Milwaukee after the age of twelve and launched her professional path at sixteen as the resident pianist at a neighborhood movie house. Following formal studies at Marquette University, she spent two years touring with a vaudeville ensemble and later earned her living as a freelance accompanist for various vocalists.

While based in Camden, New Jersey, she formed a close friendship with the emerging composer Anna Sosenko, regularly performing the songwriter’s material for industry publishers; the pair would share a home and professional partnership for roughly twenty-five years. Hildegarde also briefly plugged tunes for Irving Berlin, yet Sosenko remained the decisive force behind her ascent. An audition for the revue “Stars on Parade” prompted impresario Guy Edwards to urge her to perform under her first name alone and helped secure her initial major engagement at London’s Café du Paris. Although that debut proved disappointing, it spurred Hildegarde and Sosenko to relocate to Paris for intensive cabaret training.

During their three-year residence in the early 1930s she mastered French, Italian, Russian, and Swedish while refining her diction until every trace of a German accent vanished. More significantly, she cultivated the glamorous persona that became her trademark—elegant haute couture gowns, sparkling jewels, and signature long white gloves—which propelled her straight into New York’s most exclusive venues upon her return. Her standing among transatlantic tastemakers was such that she performed at London’s Ritz Hotel for the Duke of Kent’s wedding festivities in 1934, returned for King George V’s silver jubilee the following year, and appeared again at the 1937 coronation of King George VI.

Bolstered by Sosenko’s compositions, most notably her signature hit “Darling, Je Vous Aime Beaucoup,” Hildegarde reached the height of her fame during the World War II era. She maintained a punishing schedule of roughly forty-five weeks on the road each year, commanding $17,500 weekly plus half the gross receipts during a lengthy 1946 run; she also appeared regularly on best-dressed lists, allocating at least $10,000 annually for wardrobe even amid wartime restrictions. Revlon marketed a lipstick and nail polish bearing her name, a rose cultivar was dedicated to her, and a linen manufacturer produced handkerchiefs featuring her “Bless You” autograph. Radio personality Walter Winchell coined the billing “the Incomparable Hildegarde,” which she carried into mainstream households via the NBC series Raleigh Room, though shifting tastes toward jazz and rock & roll diminished her visibility throughout the 1950s. In 1955 she and Sosenko ended their partnership amid acrimonious public dispute and remained estranged for two decades.

She nevertheless retained strong demand on the supper-club circuit and continued selling records. Additional credits included a national tour of Stephen Sondheim’s Follies and numerous televised specials. In 1961 former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt honored her at a gala as “The First Lady of the Supper Clubs,” the same year Hildegarde released her autobiography, Over 50...So What! A 1980 revival of the 1927 musical The Five O’Clock Girl found her back onstage, while she also toured in the nostalgic revue “The Big Broadcast of 1944.” Lecture appearances supplemented her nightclub work; she marked sixty years in entertainment with a sold-out 1986 Carnegie Hall concert and made her final London appearance during a two-week engagement at Pizza on the Park in autumn 1992. Hildegarde stayed embedded in New York social circles through the 1990s until her death at age ninety-nine on July 29, 2005.