May 7: Teresa Brewer was born on this date in 1931…

… she died October 17, 2007. She was 76 years-old.

Teresa was 76 years old when she passed away from a neuromuscular diseaseorn Theresa Breuer, the diminutive pop, country and jazz singer with the big voice, grew up in Toledo, Ohio. She was one of the most popular female singers of the 1950s with hits such as "Dancin' with Someone," "Into Each Life Some Rain Must Fall," "Choo'n Gum," "Ricochet," "Baby, Baby, Baby," "Bell Bottom Blues," "Our Heartbreaking Waltz," "Pledging My Love," "Tweedle Dee" and "Rock Love," "A Tear Fell" and "Bo Weevil."

From age five to twelve, she sang and danced on the "Major Bowes Amateur Hour," then a popular touring radio show. In January 1948, 16 year-old Theresa won a local competition and (with three other winners) was sent to New York City to appear on a talent show called "Stairway to the Stars. that is when she changed the spelling of her name from Theresa Breuer to Teresa Brewer. She won a number of talent shows and played night clubs in New York. Soon after, she was signed to a recording contract.

Teresa re-emerged as a jazz vocalist in the 1980's and 1990's recording a number of albums including tribute albums to Bessie Smith, Louis Armstrong, and Irving Berlin and recorded with such jazz greats as Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Dizzy Gillespie and Bobby Hackett. Over her career, she recorded around 600 song titles.