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The Nordstrom Sisters were an American cabaret act known for their performances from 1931 to 1976.
Originally from Chicago, the sisters were of Swedish and Norwegian origin. They were frequently billed as society performers. As international cabaret singers, they were often styled as The Misses Nordstrom or introduced as those Park Avenue darlings, the Nordstrom Sisters. Their songs usually contained sexual innuendos and double entendres. [1]
The youngest sister, Dagmar Nordstrom (1903–1976), worked as the duo's composer, arranger, and pianist. [2]
The elder sister, Sigfred Nordstrom (1893–1980), sang the lead. She was the widow of Samuel Ferebee Williams (1883–1931), a confectionery executive who originated the Tootsie Roll. They were married in 1919. Williams died in October 1931. [3]
The pair lived in London for a year in 1939 and were the resident performers at The Ritz. They were often featured onboard transatlantic ocean liners, preferring the Norwegian America Line and the Cunard Line. They were always booked in first-class staterooms and took their automobile aboard ship as part of their compensation package, celebrating as the cars were first out of the hold of the ship. Everything they needed on the continent was packed in the car, and they were on their way as others were still waiting for their trunks. They sailed on the MS Sagafjord for her maiden round-the-world voyage. They always spent the month of October in Bad Gastein for the baths.[ citation needed ]
They entertained groups of 50-100 guests for cocktails for several nights to celebrate each of their birthdays and during the December and New Year holidays. Initially, they had an apartment floor in Manhattan on 53rd Street, just east of Park Avenue. When that building was demolished for a new Chemical Bank building, they, as Siggie used to say, moved to 'Albany' as the new apartment was on the northwest corner of 79th Street at Third Avenue. [ citation needed ]
Cabaret is a form of theatrical entertainment featuring music, song, dance, recitation, or drama. The performance venue might be a pub, a casino, a hotel, a restaurant, or a nightclub with a stage for performances. The audience, often dining or drinking, does not typically dance but usually sits at tables. Performances are usually introduced by a master of ceremonies (M.C.). The entertainment, as performed by an ensemble of actors and according to its European origins, is often oriented towards adult audiences and of a clearly underground nature. In the United States, striptease, burlesque, drag shows, or a solo vocalist with a pianist, as well as the venues which offer this entertainment, are often advertised as cabarets.
The Cotton Club was a New York City nightclub from 1923 to 1940. It was located on 142nd Street and Lenox Avenue (1923–1936), then briefly in the midtown Theater District (1936–1940). The club operated during the United States' era of Prohibition and Jim Crow era racial segregation. Black people initially could not patronize the Cotton Club, but the venue featured many of the most popular black entertainers of the era, including musicians Fletcher Henderson, Duke Ellington, Jimmie Lunceford, Chick Webb, Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, Fats Waller, Willie Bryant; vocalists Adelaide Hall, Ethel Waters, Cab Calloway, Bessie Smith, Lillie Delk Christian, Aida Ward, Avon Long, the Dandridge Sisters, the Will Vodery choir, The Mills Brothers, Nina Mae McKinney, Billie Holiday, Midge Williams, Lena Horne, and dancers such as Katherine Dunham, Bill Robinson, The Nicholas Brothers, Charles 'Honi' Coles, Leonard Reed, Stepin Fetchit, the Berry Brothers, The Four Step Brothers, Jeni Le Gon and Earl Snakehips Tucker.
Gertrude Lawrence was an English actress, singer, dancer and musical comedy performer known for her stage appearances in the West End of London and on Broadway in New York.
The Country Club Plaza is a privately owned regional shopping center in the Country Club District of Kansas City, Missouri. Opened in 1923, it was the first planned suburban shopping center and the first regional shopping center to accommodate shoppers arriving by car.
Princess Märtha of Sweden was Crown Princess of Norway as the spouse of the future King Olav V from 1929 until her death in 1954. The current king, Harald V, is her only son. As Olav only became king in 1957, Märtha never became Queen of Norway.
The Copacabana is a New York City nightclub that has existed in several locations. In earlier locations, many entertainers, such as Danny Thomas, Pat Cooper, and the comedy team of Martin and Lewis, made their New York debuts at the Copacabana. The Barry Manilow song "Copacabana" (1978) is named after, and set in, the club. The nightclub was used as a setting in the films Goodfellas, Raging Bull, Tootsie, The Purple Rose of Cairo, Carlito's Way, The French Connection, Martin and Lewis, Green Book, Beyond the Sea, The Irishman, and One Night in Miami. It was also used in several plays, including Barry Manilow's Copacabana. Also, the musical film Copacabana (1947), starring Groucho Marx and Carmen Miranda, takes place in the Copacabana, as does the made-for-television film based on the Manilow hit song, in which Manilow himself starred.
Vera Zorina, born Eva Brigitta Hartwig, was a Norwegian ballerina, theatre and film actress, and choreographer. Today, she is chiefly remembered for her films choreographed by her then-husband George Balanchine. They include the Slaughter on Tenth Avenue sequence from On Your Toes, The Goldwyn Follies, I Was an Adventuress with Erich Von Stroheim and Peter Lorre, Louisiana Purchase with Bob Hope, and dancing to "That Old Black Magic" in Paramount Pictures' Star Spangled Rhythm.
Dark cabaret is a musical genre that draws on the aesthetics of burlesque, vaudeville and Weimar-era cabaret, with live performances that borrow from the stylings of goth and punk.
The Rock Boat is an annual rock music-themed "floating music festival at sea" aboard a cruise ship. It takes place in different locations each cruise, with several dozen bands performing in each cruise.
The Catholic Church in the Faroe Islands goes back to the year 999, when king Olav Tryggvason of Norway sent Sigmundur Brestisson on a mission to the islands with several priests. The islands became an independent diocese in 1111, but were officially reformed in 1537 and the last Catholic bishop was executed in 1538. After 1538, the Catholic Church was only revived in 1931 as a part of the bishopric of Copenhagen. The state church is now the Protestant Faroese People's Church.
Margaretha "Greta" Keller was an Austrian and American cabaret singer and actress, who worked in some Hollywood movies and television dramas.
Dagmar Nordstrom was an American composer, pianist and singer. She performed together with her sister Siggie as a cabaret singing duo known as The Nordstrom Sisters.
Nordstrom is a chain of US department stores.
Sigfred Ann "Siggie" Nordstrom was an American model, actress, entertainer, socialite and lead singer of The Nordstrom Sisters.
Herschel Bernardi was an American actor and singer. He is best known for his supporting role in the television detective series Peter Gunn (1958–1961) for which he was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award and his starring role in the comedy television series Arnie (1970–1972) which earned him two consecutive Golden Globe Award nominations.
Hannah Williams was an American actress, singer, and comedian and former wife of bandleader Roger Wolfe Kahn and Hall of Fame boxer Jack Dempsey.
Gene Malin, also known by stage names Jean Malin and Imogene Wilson, was an American actor, emcee, and drag performer during the Jazz Age. He was one of the first openly gay performers in Prohibition-era Speakeasy culture.
Portia Nelson was an American popular singer, songwriter, actress, and author. She was best known for her appearances in 1950s cabarets, where she sang soprano.
Dawn Hampton was an American cabaret and jazz singer, saxophonist, dancer, and songwriter. Hampton began her lifelong career as a musical entertainer touring the Midwest as a three-year-old member of the Hampton family's band The Hampton Sisters in the late 1930s. During World War II and into early 1950s, she performed as part of a quartet with her three sisters and in a jazz band with all nine of her surviving siblings. Hampton moved to New York City in 1958 to pursue a solo career as a cabaret singer. She became a singer/songwriter and dancer, which included off-Broadway theatre performances and swing dancing in Hollywood films. Along with other members of the musical Hamptons, she was a recipient of the State of Indiana's Governor Arts Award (1991) and honored at the Indy Jazz Fest (2000) in Indianapolis, Indiana.
The Theatre Row Building is a complex of five Off-Broadway theatres at 410 West 42nd Street on Theatre Row in Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan, New York City. The building is owned by the 501(c)(3) organization non-profit Building for the Arts and is the center piece of an effort to transform the adult entertainment district on 42nd Street between Ninth Avenue and Tenth Avenue into an Off-Broadway theater district.
