Marlene VerPlanck devoted her artistry to the Great American Songbook. Raised in Newark, New Jersey, she absorbed the sounds of Frank Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald through WNEW broadcasts and maintained a lifelong creative partnership with her husband Billy VerPlanck, who served as arranger, composer, and conductor. On her seventeenth release, the 2000 album My Impetuous Heart, she rejoined longtime associates, among them pianist Hank Jones, with guest appearances by pianists George Shearing and Marian McPartland plus guitarist Bucky Pizzarelli. Throughout an extended series of accomplishments, VerPlanck demonstrated remarkable range, her supple and expressive instrument always attuned to narrative nuance.
She began performing at nineteen. Her professional path originated in the 1950s with engagements alongside Tex Beneke and Charlie Spivak. The pivotal opportunity arrived in 1955 when she joined pianist Hank Jones, flutist Herbie Mann, trumpeter Joe Wilder, bassist Wendell Marshall, and drummer Kenny Clarke for the Savoy Records session I Think of You with Every Breath I Take. She encountered her future husband during a tenure with Charlie Spivak’s ensemble; the pair subsequently transferred to the Dorsey Brothers Orchestra. After Tommy Dorsey’s passing in 1956, the VerPlancks remained in New York City, contributing to studio dates with Sinatra, Perry Como, Tony Bennett, Antonio Carlos Jobim, Blood, Sweat & Tears, and Kiss. Outside jazz circles, countless listeners first encountered her through 1960s advertising spots that included the lines “Weekends were made for Michelob/Yeah!,” “Winston tastes good like a cigarette should!,” and “Mmm good/Mm-mm good/That’s what Campbell’s Soups are/Mm-mm good.” Following years of session work and thousands of jingles, the couple relocated to their Clifton, New Jersey residence and concentrated on joint performances and recordings.
Their initial collaborative project, A Breath of Fresh Air, was arranged, produced, and conducted by Billy VerPlanck in 1968. In 1976 Marlene VerPlanck began an association with North Carolina composer and pianist Loonis McGlohon, who engaged her for two episodes of the radio program Alec Wilder’s American Popular Song that he co-hosted. She subsequently issued Marlene VerPlanck Sings Alec Wilder and, following Wilder’s death, appeared on the successor broadcast The American Popular Singers alongside McGlohon and soprano Eileen Farrell. VerPlanck’s New York appearances encompassed Carnegie Hall, Michael’s Pub, and the Rainbow Room, while television credits included Entertainment Tonight, The Today Show, and CBS Sunday Morning. In the Digital Mood, which featured VerPlanck together with Mel Tormé and Julius La Rosa accompanied by the Glenn Miller Orchestra, became the first gold-certified big-band compact disc of the 1990s. She continued performing and recording through the 2000s and 2010s, releasing Once There Was a Moon (2008), One Dream at a Time (2010), Ballads... Mostly (2013), and The Mood I’m In (2016), all on the Audiophile label. Marlene VerPlanck passed away in Manhattan during January 2018 at the age of eighty-four.
