Jane Olivor

Jane Cohen from Brooklyn, NY, remade herself into French-style cabaret singer Jane Olivor in the downtown Manhattan club scene of the early '70s. Employing an emphatic style that reminded some listeners of French chanteuse Edith Piaf and others of fellow Brooklynite Barbra Streisand, Olivor built a following among gay men and other fans of traditional pop, transforming songs like "Some Enchanted Evening" from the Broadway musical South Pacific and the Fleetwoods' 1959 hit "Come Softly to Me" into personal statements at venues such as the Greenwich Village nightclub Reno Sweeney's and the Garment District supper club the Ballroom. She attracted enough attention that Columbia Records signed her, issuing her debut album, First Night, in 1976. That LP failed to chart despite positive critical notices, but "Some Enchanted Evening" belatedly became a minor singles chart entry just before the September 1977 release of her second album, Chasing Rainbows, which reached the Top 100 bestsellers, remaining in the charts for three months. With that, Olivor began to appear in major concert halls around the country. Stay the Night, released in the spring of 1978, featured another minor chart entry, Olivor's cover of the Chiffons' 1963 hit "He's So Fine," which marked a slight improvement in her chart statistics. She next sang a duet with Johnny Mathis on "The Last Time I Felt Like This," the theme from the 1978 film Same Time Next Year. The recording made the Top 20 on the easy listening charts, and when it was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Song, Mathis and Olivor sang it at the Oscar ceremony. By now, Olivor was headlining at the Greek Theatre in Los Angeles, Carnegie Hall in New York, and other prestigious venues. Her fourth album, The Best Side of Goodbye, released in...