Zoletta Lynn Taylor (March 17, 1938 – April 30, 2007) was an American singer. She was the original female member of The Platters from 1954 to 1962, when the group produced most of their popular singles. The Platters are an American vocal group formed in 1952. They are one of the most successful vocal groups of the early rock and roll era. Originally, their distinctive sound was a bridge between the pre-rock Tin Pan Alley tradition and the burgeoning new genre. The act has gone through several personnel changes, with one of the most successful incarnations comprising lead tenor Tony Williams, David Lynch, Paul Robi, Herb Reed, and Zola Taylor. The group had 40 charting singles on the Billboard Hot 100 chart between 1955 and 1967, including four number-one hits.
In June 1953, the band released two singles with Federal Records, under the management of Bass, but found little success. Bass then asked his friend, music entrepreneur and songwriter Buck Ram, to coach the group in hope of getting a hit record. Ram made some changes to the lineup, most notably the addition of female vocalist Zola Taylor and, in autumn 1954, the replacement of Alex Hodge by Paul Robi. Under Ram's guidance, The Platters recorded eight songs for Federal in the R&B/gospel style, scoring a few minor regional hits on the West Coast, and backed Williams' sister, Linda Hayes. One song recorded during their Federal tenure, "Only You (And You Alone)", originally written by Ram for the Ink Spots, was deemed unreleasable by the label, though copies of this early version do exist. Convinced by Jean Bennett and Tony Williams that "Only You" had potential, Ram had The Platters re-record the song during their first session for Mercury. Released in the summer of 1955, it became the group's first Top Ten hit on the pop charts and topped the R&B charts for seven weeks. The follow-up, "The Great Pretender", with lyrics written in the washroom of the Flamingo Hotel in Las Vegas by Buck Ram, exceeded the success of their debut and became The Platters' first national #1 hit. "The Great Pretender" was also the act's biggest R&B hit, with an 11-week run atop that chart. In 1956, The Platters appeared in the first major motion picture based around rock and roll, Rock Around the Clock, and performed both "Only You" and "The Great Pretender".
The Platters' unique vocal style had touched a nerve in the music-buying public, and a string of hit singles followed, including three more national #1 hits and more modest chart successes such as "I'm Sorry" (#11) and "He's Mine" (#23) in 1957, "Enchanted" (#12) in 1959, and "(You've Got) The Magic Touch" (#4) in 1956. The Platters soon hit upon the successful formula of updating older standards, such as "My Prayer", "Twilight Time", "Harbor Lights", "To Each His Own", "If I Didn't Care", and Jerome Kern's "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes". Zola Taylor was a member of The Platters until 1962, when she was replaced by singer Barbara Randolph.
The group was inducted
into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1990 and into the Vocal Group
Hall of Fame in its inaugural year of 1998. The Platters were the first
rock and roll era group to have a Top Ten album in the United States.
They were also the only act to have three songs included on the American
Graffiti soundtrack that fueled an oldies revival already underway in
the early to mid-1970s: "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes", "The Great
Pretender", and "Only You (and You Alone)". Zola Taylor died in Riverside, CA at age 69, from pneumonia, following a series of strokes.
