The Andrews Sisters the group was formed, and 12 when they won first prize at a talent contest at the local Orpheum Theatre in Minneapolis, where LaVerne played piano accompaniment for the silent film showings in exchange for free dancing lessons for herself and her sisters. Following the collapse of their father's Minneapolis restaurant, the sisters went on the road to support the family. They started their career as imitators of an earlier successful singing group, the Boswell Sisters, who were popular in the 1930s. After singing with various dance bands and touring in vaudeville with the likes of Leon Belasco (and his
The Hampton Sisters Hampton family of four sisters and five brothers performed at New York City's Carnegie Hall and Harlem's Apollo Theater and the Savoy Ballroom. The group also toured the United States and performed as the house band at nightclubs in Indianapolis and Cincinnati, Ohio. Dawn Hampton left the group in 1958 to pursue a solo career as a New York City cabaret singer and, later, a swing dancer, while the other sisters formed a trio and continued to perform as the Hampton Sisters for several more years. Carmalita reunited with her sisters, Aletra and Virtue, in 1981, after a nearly twenty-year