Joan Weber, who broke chart records with her 1954 hit "Let Me Go, Devil," died at the age of 45 in a psychiatric hospital after her career faded into obscurity. The singer, discovered while pregnant with her first child, saw her fame collapse within 18 months of her record-breaking success.
Record-Breaking Rise
Weber, married to bandleader George Verfaillie at 18, was discovered in 1954 when she was 21. She had recorded a demo that Mitch Miller from Columbia Records described as having "a five-and-dime" voice. Despite this, Miller selected her to sing "Let Me Go, Devil" for an episode of the TV show Studio One about shady dealings in the recording industry, wanting "a voice nobody knew" so it wouldn't overshadow the episode.
The track, previously recorded by Georgie Shaw without chart success, was played six times during the show's November 15, 1954, airing. Within two weeks, it sold half a million copies, marking the first time in pop chart history that a song entered the charts after appearing on one episode of a television show.
Rapid Decline
By January 1955, the record topped every US chart, reached number 16 in the UK, and sold over a million copies. Weber gave birth to a daughter, Terry Lynn, and undertook a contract at the Copacabana nightclub, earning a reputed $10,000 a week, approximately $125,723 (around £103,131) in today's money.
Despite taking singing and elocution lessons, her follow-up singles failed to chart, and she was dropped from her record contract just 18 months later. She resumed her nightclub career in 1957, performing in Dallas, Houston, New Orleans, Ottawa, and Washington, but could not sustain it.
Final Years
By 1969, royalty checks mailed to her last known address were returned as undeliverable. In 1975, American Top 40 listed her as number one on its Top 40 Disappearing Acts special episode.
Weber worked as a library clerk in New Jersey at one point. Her final years were spent in the Ancora Psychiatric Hospital in Winslow Township, New Jersey, where she died from heart failure on May 13, 1981, at the age of 45. She was buried in Eglington Cemetery, Clarksboro, New Jersey.
