Collections Highlight: The Lennon Sisters

On Christmas Eve, 1955, four children graced the Los Angeles sound stage of the Lawrence Welk Show, launching the 70-year journey of one of America’s most-admired female vocal groups. Dianne (Dee Dee), 16, Peggy, 14, Kathy, 12, and Janet, 9, earnestly intoned an a cappella rendition of the sacred song “He,” establishing the Lennon Sisters as a household name.

“Through television you can reach many lonely, unhappy people. Maybe you can make their days brighter”{i} – Sis Lennon

That first performance set in motion a career made significantly on television. The Lennon Sisters appeared on the Lawrence Welk Show every Saturday night until 1968, brightening the days of audiences across the country. For three decades they guested on television shows like the George Burns Show, the Tonight Show, the Newly Wed Show, and the Ed Sullivan Show among dozens of others. The girls also toured, visiting every state in the country, and over the course of the 1950s and 1960s they recorded twelve albums for Dot Records, with their single “Sad Movies (Make Me Cry)" reaching Number 56 on the Billboard Hot 100. The quartet became young professionals early on—still high school students but consummate performers and recording artists. In 1960 Dianne left to get married but returned to the group in 1964.

In 1969 the sisters secured their own television variety show, Jimmy Durante Presents the Lennon Sisters, airing Friday nights on ABC. While it lasted only one season, the show was a classic example from the heyday of television variety shows, featuring skits, songs, and sketches with a myriad of the who’s who of the day. Nearly half of the 104 arrangements held in the Lennon Sisters Collection at the Great American Songbook Foundation Library & Archives are from Jimmy Durante Presents the Lennon Sisters. By this time their style had crystallized: their pitch-perfect close harmonies with lush orchestral accompaniment provided by George Wyle and his orchestra.

America’s Favorite Sibling Acts

On October 24, 1969, the Lennon Sisters were joined by another of America’s favorite family acts, the Osmond Brothers, for a captivating medley of rain songs.

"The Osmond Brothers were, and will always be, family to us. We have a mutual admiration society. This George Wyle vocal arrangement is, to this day, a classic for all nine of us. We performed it when they were guests on our TV series, singing and dancing to the fabulous choreography of Jack Regas. We all remember on taping day our two dads sitting together, with tears in their eyes, watching us with such pride. It was only four days later that our dad died." {ii}

The medley of rain songs performed by the Lennons and the Osmonds features intricate vocal harmonies. Two people were responsible for creating this arrangement: Sid Feller and George Wyle. Most likely their music director, George Wyle, created the vocal treatment first: selecting which songs to include, deciding how to combine them, and writing the complex harmonies and the interplay between the Lennons and the Osmonds. Feller was then responsible for orchestrating the arrangement, selecting which instruments would play which parts and writing the complementary counterpoint. The arrangers often had very little time to create the numerous arrangements the Lennon Sisters and their guests performed on the show.

The Anatomy of an Arrangement

The medley opens with the full ensemble singing Jimmy Van Heusen and Johnny Burke’s “Here’s That Rainy Day” in block harmonies over static strings. Chromaticism combines with added fourths, sevenths, and ninths to pair perfectly with the stationary stool opening. The steady, measured opening contrasts with the zip of “Singin’ in the Rain.” The original song by Nacio Herb Brown with lyrics by Arthur Freed is in common time -- four beats to the measure. In the version immortalized in the 1952 film of the same name, Gene Kelly draws out the syllable “sing” for two and a half beats, musically matching the breadth of his smile. The final notes of the phrase are stretched. In contrast, Fellers and Wyle set the song in triple meter with only three beats per measure. The Lennon Sisters barely alight on the notes, clipping syllables, adding extra words, and creating a fresh sound to an established classic.

Most medleys are constructed with one song following another. More sophisticated medleys weave together two or more songs, what we might refer to as a “mash-up” today. Here, Feller and Wyle ingeniously serpentine two melodies: “Rain,” music and lyrics by Eugene Ford and popularized by Dean Martin; and “Rain on the Roof” by Ann Ronell. The two songs have similar arcs but they are inverted—where “Rain” goes down, “Rain on the Roof” goes up, and vice versa. The Lennon Sisters trill out “Rain” over the Osmond Brothers crooning “Rain on the Roof” in a bossa nova style. The curve of the melodies pull the two groups together in the middle of the phrase. Updated and added lyrics ensure that this rendition of classic songs is fresh and unique as befits the tradition of the Great American Songbook.

The texture thins to just two musical lines as we break into “Let a Smile Be Your Umbrella” by Sammy Fain with lyrics by Irving Kahal and Francis Wheeler. The act climaxes with a nine-year-old Donny Osmond belting out the lyric “Whenever skies are gray, don’t worry or fret, a smile will bring the sunshine.” The others join him on “You’ll never, never, never get wet.”

We return to “Rain” with the block harmonies of the opening but this time over a lush, up-tempo, brassy accompaniment. The song slows with a repeated slurred “rain” as the dance winds to a close. The medley ends softly with the performers back where they opened: sitting on stools, the music mirroring the rise and decline of a rainstorm perfectly.

The full score, vocal score, and a complete set of parts are present in the Lennon Sisters Collection. View the annotated vocal score here.

Partnership with Andy Williams

Jimmy Durante Presents the Lennon Sisters lasted only one season: the Lennon Sisters were overshadowed by Durante,[iii} and the tragic murder of their father dampened the spirit of the show.{iv} The Lennon Sisters then entered into a decade-long relationship with Andy Williams, first performing on his eponymous show, then taking up a residency in Las Vegas. When Williams’ father, Jay Emerson Williams, died in 1976, the Lennon Sisters performed at the funeral. In a note sent to the sisters, Williams wrote “Girls—words cannot possibly express my appreciation to you for singing at my father’s funeral. The sound was that of angels and I’m sure that he heard you loud + clear. I love you all and thank you from the very bottom of my heart.”

In 1994, the Lennons moved to Branson, Missouri, where they were featured performers at the Lawrence Welk Champagne Theater until 2012. To bring their career full circle, Andy Williams had also moved to Branson in 1992, opening the Moon River Theatre.

They Call Me Mimi

In 1999 the youngest of the performing Lennon Sisters, Mimi, officially joined the group, replacing Peggy who was retiring. It wasn’t her first appearance, however: as early as 1960, a four-year-old Mimi performed “Do Re Mi” with the quartet, demonstrating her unerring pitch. Today, Mimi, along with Kathy and Janet, continue the legacy of the Lennon Sisters.

“Our sisterhood is as close as our harmonies”—Janet Lennon {v}

There is a special chemistry in singing families: the Von Trapp Singers, the Andrews Sisters, the Jackson 5, and, of course, the Lennon Sisters. The voices naturally blend so well together, it is almost as though one voice is singing in harmony with itself. As Mimi says, “This magic happens. It’s a wonderful feeling that’s really hard to describe because it’s just a perfect blend of music and sisterhood and family.” {vi}

The Lennons’ Legacy

2025 marks the 70th anniversary of the Lennon Sisters’ debut on the Lawrence Welk Show on December 24, 1955. Their legacy is secure. They have performed for seven consecutive United States Presidents. In 1987 a star was placed in their honor on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. They were inducted into the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2001 and in 2022 they received the Standard Award in the Great American Songbook Foundation’s Songbook Hall of Fame. The Songbook Foundation Library & Archives Lennon Sisters Collection contains the charts of 104 musical arrangements dating from their 1969 variety show to music for the modern trio in the 2010s. In 2025, a special exhibit accompanying a screening of the documentary Showstoppers! Great Women of TV Variety displayed four matching gowns loaned for the occasion by the Lennon Sisters.

References

[i] The Lennon Sisters’s mother said these words to the girls as they prepared to go on to their first performance on the Lawrence Welk Show in 1955. Quoted in The Lennon Sisters, Same Song, Separate Voices (Branson, Missouri: Lennon Publishing, 1995), 80. [Book]

[ii] Kathy Lennon in liner notes to album: The Lennon Sisters, Dream a Little Dream (PollyOEntertainment, 2020)

[iii] Jack Gould, “TV: ABC Presents 3 Premieres,” New York Times, September 27, 1969, NY Times Time Machine, May 12, 2025

[iv] “Lennons’ Father Is Slain on Coast,” New York Times, August 13, 1969, NY Times Time Machine, May 12, 2025.

[v] The Lennon Sisters: Same Song, Separate Voices (PollyOEntertainment, 2011) [Documentary]

[vi] The Lennon Sisters: Same Song, Separate Voices (PollyOEntertainment, 2011) [Documentary special feature]

All photos from various collections housed in the Songbook Library & Archives.