While studying composition at the Manhattan School of Music, I had some wonderful mentors – including my voice teacher Jackie Presti. At the start of my junior year, I realized I needed a job – something other than waiting tables..and Jackie got a call that they were looking for a new singer at the Rainbow Room and she recommended me. So I auditioned out of the blue. I had never sung a professional gig, I’d cut my hair really short and they thought I looked like Doris Day and liked my voice, so they hired me. After being offered the job, I literally had to call my mother from a pay phone to ask her where the Rainbow Room was! It launched my career and changed my life…It was an incredible way to start out. I learned hundreds of songs. For 18 months, I sang six nights a week for five and a half hours a night. It was a great band and I was in heaven. I was magically glamorized – they had me wearing all these fabulous dresses, I was learning from some of the best side-men in the business, and I had complete freedom to really hone my craft. I was the luckiest singer in New York- I learned the way all of the great singers did- on the bandstand. It gave me an appreciation of the American Songbook that will stay with me forever. I loved those days so much!
When they closed the room, in 1999, I was devastated. I was literally the last big band singer in New York….It was like a dream, like a movie.
Hilary Kole youngest performer at RAINBOW ROOM circa 1998