Bing Crosby

Bing Crosby was the archetypal crooner, the singer who turned the intimacy of the microphone into an art form and became one of the most popular entertainers of the 20th century. Born Harry Lillis Crosby on May 3, 1903, in Tacoma, Washington, and raised in Spokane, he was a leader in record sales, radio ratings and film box office for roughly five decades. His relaxed, conversational singing style shaped generations of pop vocalists, and his recording of “White Christmas” remains the best-selling single of all time. By the mid-1970s, around 400 million copies of his records had been sold worldwide.

From Spokane to stardom

Crosby picked up the nickname “Bing” as a boy, reportedly from a comic strip he loved. He sang and played drums while studying law at Gonzaga University, but music pulled him away from the courtroom. He left Spokane to perform, joined the Paul Whiteman orchestra as part of a vocal trio called the Rhythm Boys, and appeared in the early sound film King of Jazz. His real breakthrough came in 1931 and 1932, when CBS gave him his own network radio program. Almost overnight he became a national star, and a recording contract with Decca and a film deal with Paramount soon followed.

The crooner’s voice

What set Crosby apart was timing as much as talent. His rise coincided with rapid advances in radio broadcasting and microphone technology, which rewarded a soft, close, almost spoken delivery rather than the booming projection of earlier singers. He used the new tools better than anyone, developing an intimate baritone that sounded like a friend talking directly to the listener. That style influenced nearly every major male singer who followed, including Frank Sinatra, Perry Como, Dean Martin, and even Elvis Presley and John Lennon. For more than a decade he hosted the popular radio variety show Kraft Music Hall, where a single broadcast of a new song regularly sold tens of thousands of copies the next day.

“White Christmas” and the movies

Crosby introduced Irving Berlin’s “White Christmas” in the 1942 film Holiday Inn, and the recording became a phenomenon unlike any other. It topped the charts that year, returned to number one again and again across the decade, and has sold more than 50 million copies as a single, with total sales above 100 million, making it the best-selling single ever released. He was a movie star to match his recording fame, winning the Academy Award for Best Actor for Going My Way in 1944 and teaming with Bob Hope and Dorothy Lamour for the hugely popular “Road” comedies. Across his career he sang four different Oscar-winning songs and appeared in more than 70 films.

A quiet innovator

Crosby was also a shrewd businessman and a genuine technological pioneer. In 1947 he invested in the Ampex company, which built the first commercial reel-to-reel tape recorders, and he became the first major performer to pre-record his radio shows and master his recordings on magnetic tape. That single decision helped reshape the entire broadcasting and recording industry, paving the way for the techniques studios still rely on. During World War II he was voted the person who had done the most for the morale of American troops, beating out generals and the president himself in a poll of servicemen.

The most recorded voice

Crosby’s reach was almost impossible to overstate at his peak. He recorded more than 1,600 songs, and at one point his records accounted for a large share of all the recorded music played on American radio each week. He earned three stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, in the categories of motion pictures, radio and audio recording, and in 1962 he became the first recipient of the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. One of his final recordings, a 1977 holiday duet with David Bowie on “Peace on Earth / Little Drummer Boy,” became an unlikely classic in its own right, pairing the old crooner with a glam-rock star.

A lasting standard

Crosby died of a heart attack in 1977 after a round of golf at a course near Madrid, Spain. He left behind a body of work that still defines traditional American pop, and a holiday recording that returns to the charts every December decades later. His easy, unforced delivery set the template for the singers who became stars after him, which is why he is often described not just as a great entertainer of his time but as the man who taught popular music how to sing into a microphone.

A family and a fortune

Crosby married actress and singer Dixie Lee in 1930, and the couple had four sons before her death in 1952; he later married actress Kathryn Grant, with whom he had three more children. An astute investor as well as an entertainer, he built one of the largest fortunes in Hollywood, drawn from both his earnings and his stakes in companies and technology. He published a popular autobiography, Call Me Lucky, in 1953, and ran a successful television production company in his later years.

Most loved songs

A starting point through his vast catalogue. Each title opens through the in-site player.

From holiday standards to Depression-era ballads, Crosby’s voice defined American popular music for decades. If one of his songs is stuck in your head, type it into the search box above to find it.