Although Yvonne Elliman's period of prominence proved fleeting in the mid-1970s, she lent her voice to numerous major recordings of the decade as a backing singer.
During her high-school years in Hawaii, she performed with the ensemble We Folk. After relocating to London in 1969, she took the stage at the Pheasantry folk club on Kings Road in Chelsea. Songwriters Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice encountered her there and cast her as Mary Magdalene in their rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar, a role that immediately established her reputation. She reprised the Magdalene part in the motion-picture adaptation of Superstar, earning a Golden Globe nomination while also scoring a hit with "I Don't Know How to Love Him." That single supplied the name for her first album, issued in 1972. Pete Townshend contributed a guest appearance to her follow-up release, the 1973 album Food of Love. While performing in the Broadway production of Jesus Christ Superstar in the United States, she met Bill Oakes, president of RSO Records, and the pair wed shortly thereafter. Oakes arranged an introduction to Eric Clapton and asked her to provide backing vocals on "I Shot the Sheriff." She subsequently joined the guitarist's touring and recording ensemble, remaining with him for five years.
In 1975 she signed with RSO and issued the Steve Cropper-produced Rising Sun. Barry Gibb and Robin Gibb composed the title track for her subsequent album, 1976's Love Me, which registered as a U.K. hit and opened the door to her largest commercial achievement on the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack. The Bee Gees supplied several tracks for that collection expressly for Elliman, among them the number-one single "If I Can't Have You." After issuing two further albums and resuming session work, she reemerged in 2004 with the Simple Needs EP and maintained an active performance schedule well into the 2010s.
