Kay Allen

aka Cathy Allen

Photo of Kay Allen

  • Birth Name

    Catherine Elentrio (also spelled Lentrio or Eleuterio)

  • Born

    February 14, 1918
    Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

  • Died

    September 1994 (age 76)
    Miami, Florida

  • Orchestras

    Lou Breese
    Randy Brooks
     Al Donahue
     Joe Frasetto
    Enoch Light
    Carlos Molina
    Red Norvo
     Jimmy Palmer
    Louis Prima
     Joe Reichman
    Justin Stone
    Jerry Wald

Vo­cal­ist Kay Allen sang with a va­ri­ety of or­ches­tras dur­ing the 1940s but never found major suc­cess until she changed her stage name to Cathy Allen and joined Louis Prima’s band in 1946. After the birth of her first child in 1948, she set­tled in her home­town of Philadel­phia and worked lo­cally through the mid-​1950s be­fore re­tir­ing from show busi­ness and mov­ing to Florida with her hus­band in 1962.

The daugh­ter of Ital­ian im­mi­grants, Allen got her start, as did sev­eral band singers, on the Horn and Hardart’s Chil­dren’s Hour pro­gram on Philadel­phia radio sta­tion WCAU. In May or June 1940, she joined Al Don­ahue’s band, leav­ing by mid-​July to join Joe Frasetto’s or­ches­tra at WIP in Philadel­phia. By the first of 1941, she was with Joe Re­ich­man, mov­ing to Enoch Light’s band by mid-​year, where she played on the group’s base­ball team. In late 1941 she joined Red Norvo’s new or­ches­tra, pos­si­bly stay­ing until sum­mer 1942 when Norvo dis­banded. By Au­gust 1942, she was with Lou Breese, re­main­ing as part of his group when he pared down to ten pieces and set­tled in as the house band at the Chez Paree night club in Chicago, where she also worked the floor show.

At some point, Allen mar­ried a man by the name of Zap­pa­sodi. The cou­ple di­vorced in April 1943. Ac­cord­ing to fam­ily sources, she also dated base­ball leg­end Dom DiMag­gio. Allen sang with Breese until at least late 1943. By early 1944, though, she was with Car­los Molina’s Latin or­ches­tra, leav­ing the group around the first of March. She then spent time with Justin Stone’s 10-​piece band at the 400 Club in New York be­fore ap­par­ently re­join­ing Molina. She left Molina again in April and sang with Jimmy Palmer, her for­mer fel­low chirp with Breese who had taken over Gra­cie Bar­rie’s band, but was back with Molina again in May.

By Jan­u­ary 1945, and likely as early as Oc­to­ber or No­vem­ber 1944, Allen had joined Jerry Wald’s band, re­main­ing with the clar­inet player through early 1946 and record­ing sev­eral songs with the group. While with Wald’s or­ches­tra, she fell in love with fel­low singer Dick Mer­rick, and the two be­came en­gaged in No­vem­ber 1945. They mar­ried in De­cem­ber 1946.[1] Both she and Mer­rick had left Wald by March of that year. Allen joined Claude Thorn­hill’s new group that month but left be­fore it de­buted in late May. In Au­gust, she be­came singer for Randy Brooks, where she stayed through at least Oc­to­ber.

In late 1946, Allen at­tracted the at­ten­tion of MGM, who signed her to a con­tract. The stu­dio dyed her hair blonde and changed her pro­fes­sional name to Cathy, but Allen ul­ti­mately de­cided against going to Hol­ly­wood. By as early as No­vem­ber 1946 but no later than March 1947 she had joined Louis Prima, stay­ing and record­ing with the band­leader until at least April 1948 when she an­nounced her de­par­ture in ex­pec­ta­tion of the birth of her first child, who was born in Sep­tem­ber.

After leav­ing Prima, Allen set­tled back in Philadel­phia with her hus­band, where she began to sing in local night­clubs and ap­pear on local tele­vi­sion, hav­ing a reg­u­lar spot on WPTZ’s The Girl Next Door. She and Mer­rick recorded to­gether on the Ad­mi­ral label in 1949.

In 1952, Allen be­came singer for Char­lie Ven­tura’s band at his Open House club in nearby Lin­den­wald, New Jer­sey. In April 1954, she was work­ing as a DJ on WPEN, singing as well as spin­ning records on her own Sun­day night pro­gram. In 1962, she and Mer­rick set­tled in Florida. Kay Allen passed away in 1994 at age 76.

Notes

  1. Mer­rick and Allen ap­plied for a mar­riage li­cense in Philadel­phia on No­vem­ber 30, 1946. On the ap­pli­ca­tion, Allen made her­self four years younger, list­ing her birth year as 1922 when it was ac­tu­ally 1918. The cou­ple mar­ried on De­cem­ber 3. ↩︎

Sources

  1. “Orchestra Notes.” Billboard 28 Sep. 1940: 10.
  2. “Enoch Light Ball Team Whips McGee's.” Down Beat 1 Jul. 1941: 5.
  3. “Weird Is the Word For Newst Norvo Ork, His Largest.” Down Beat 1 Jan. 1942: 1.
  4. “Vaudeville Reviews: Oriental, Chicago.” Billboard 4 Apr. 1942: 18.
  5. “Vaudeville Reviews: Colonial, Dayton, O.” Billboard 2 May 1942: 36.
  6. “Fulcher Leaves... With Sideman.” Billboard 1 Sep. 1942: 19.
  7. “On the Stage.” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette 5 Sep. 1942: 12.
  8. “Night Club Reviews: Chez Paree, Chicago.” Billboard 14 Nov. 1942: 12.
  9. “On the Air: Lou Breese.” Billboard 30 Jan. 1943: 22.
  10. “Chez Lovely.” Billboard 1 May 1943: 5.
  11. “Night Club Reviews: Chez Paree, Chicago.” Billboard 26 Jun. 1943: 15.
  12. “Night Club Reviews: Chez Paree, Chicago.” Billboard 21 Aug. 1943: 20.
  13. “Kids' Show Discloses Fine Musical Talent.” Down Beat 1 Mar. 1944: 2.
  14. “Molina Looking for Thrush.” Billboard 11 Mar. 1944: 16.
  15. “Strictly Ad Lib.” Down Beat 1 Apr. 1944: 5.
  16. “Norfolk Spots Palmer.” Down Beat 15 Apr. 1944: 10.
  17. “From Kay to Kay.” Billboard 29 Apr. 1944: 15.
  18. “Music Grapevine.” Billboard 20 May 1944: 14.
  19. “Strictly Ad Lib.” Down Beat 1 Jun. 1944: 5.
  20. “Strictly Ad Lib.” Down Beat 15 Jan. 1945: 5.
  21. “Advanced Record Releases.” Billboard 5 May 1945: 23.
  22. “Strictly Ad Lib.” Down Beat 1 Dec. 1945: 1.
  23. “New Wald Chirp.” Billboard 25 Mar. 1946: 2.
  24. “Music As Written.” Billboard 20 Apr. 1946: 26.
  25. “Music As Written.” Billboard 4 May 1946: 21.
  26. “400 Reopens With Three Orks.” Down Beat 9 Sep. 1946: 1.
  27. Wilson, Earl. “Feet Edson Tells of Good Old Days.” The Miami News 16 Oct. 1946: 11B.
  28. “Randy's Chirp.” Down Beat 4 Nov. 1946: 5.
  29. “Girl Singer (With Band).” Down Beat 18 Dec. 1946: 21.
  30. “Vaudeville Reviews: Strand, New York.” Billboard 15 Mar. 1947: 38.
  31. “Music As Written.” Billboard 26 Apr. 1947: 23.
  32. “Strictly Ad Lib.” Down Beat 7 Apr. 1948: 5.
  33. “Music As Written.” Billboard 9 Oct. 1948: 25.
  34. “Things to Come.” Down Beat 21 Oct. 1949: 11.
  35. “Music As Written.” Billboard 22 Oct. 1949: 18.
  36. “Music As Written.” Billboard 18 Feb. 1950: 45.
  37. “Record Reviews.” Billboard 3 Jun. 1950: 117.
  38. “Brookhauser Does a Solid Philadelphia Ed Sullivan.” Billboard 17 Feb. 1951: 8.
  39. “Music As Written.” Billboard 27 Dec. 1952: 15.
  40. “Music As Written.” Billboard 3 Apr. 1954: 38.
  41. “United States Census, 1920,” FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MXSJ-CP9 : Thu Dec 07 21:14:49 UTC 2023), Entry for Miachael Lentrio and Catherine Lentrio, 1920.
  42. “United States Census, 1930,” FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:XHWK-GHT : Fri Oct 06 04:43:33 UTC 2023), Entry for Alphonse Elentrio and Teresa Elentrio, 1930.
  43. “Pennsylvania, County Marriages, 1885-1950,” FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:Q28G-1F6H : Sun Oct 15 16:53:58 UTC 2023), Entry for Louis A Ricciardi and Chatherine M Elenteis Elentrio Zappasodi, 30 Nov. 1946.
  44. “Pennsylvania, County Marriages, 1885-1950,” FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:Q28G-18DT : Sun Oct 15 15:50:58 UTC 2023), Entry for Louis A Ricciardi and Catherine M Elentrio Zappasodi, 3. Dec 1946.
  45. Ricci, Ray. Emails to BandChirps. 15-22 Sep. 2024.