Danièle Dorice ( Angers; July 23, 1935 – March 12, 2018) was a Canadian singer and teacher of dance, staging and voice. She began her career as a singer in amateur shows in 1958 and went on to tour countries in Europe, the Far East and South America. Dorice also toured for the

Canadian Broadcasting Corporation The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (), branded as CBC/Radio-Canada, is the Canadian Public broadcasting, public broadcaster for both radio and television. It is a Crown corporation that serves as the national public broadcaster, with its E ...

(CBC) performing at

Canadian Armed Forces The Canadian Armed Forces (CAF; , FAC) are the unified Military, military forces of Canada, including sea, land, and air commands referred to as the Royal Canadian Navy, Canadian Army and the Royal Canadian Air Force. Under the ''National Defenc ...

bases across the world and presented television programs on

Ici Radio-Canada Télé Ici Radio-Canada Télé (stylized as ICI Radio-Canada Télé, and sometimes abbreviated as Ici Télé) is a Television in Canada, Canadian Canadian French, French-language terrestrial television, free-to-air television network owned by the Can ...

and

CTV Television Network The CTV Television Network, commonly known as CTV, is a Television in Canada, Canadian English-language terrestrial television network. Launched in 1961 and acquired by BCE Inc. in 2000, CTV is Canada's largest privately owned List of Canadian ...

. She also performed on American talk shows and founded the

Montreal Montreal is the List of towns in Quebec, largest city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Quebec, the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-largest in Canada, and the List of North American cit ...

-based artistic agency Les Productions Danièle Dorice Inc in 1971 before going on to teach there.

Personal life

Dorice was born on July 23, 1935, in

Quebec City Quebec City is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Quebec. As of July 2021, the city had a population of 549,459, and the Census Metropolitan Area (including surrounding communities) had a populati ...

Quebec Quebec is Canada's List of Canadian provinces and territories by area, largest province by area. Located in Central Canada, the province shares borders with the provinces of Ontario to the west, Newfoundland and Labrador to the northeast, ...

. She was the daughter of Loretta LeClair and Roland Angers and had five siblings, including her sister Denyse Angé who is also a singer. Dorice was married to William Anton Skerczak, with whom she had a daughter. She died on March 12, 2018, from cancer in

Outremont, Quebec Outremont () is an affluent residential borough (''arrondissement'') of the city of Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It consists entirely of the former city on the Island of Montreal in southwestern Quebec. The neighbourhood is inhabited largely by F ...

. Dorice was given a funeral service at Mount Royal Funeral Complex four days later.

Career

While working as a secretary in Quebec City, she began her career working as a singer in amateur shows in 1958, winning the Miss Personality Canada contest and earning her a

screen test A screen test is a method of determining the suitability of an actor or actress for performing on film or in a particular role. It is typically a secondary or later stage in the audition process. The performer is generally given a scene, or sel ...

with

The Rank Organisation The Rank Organisation (founded as the J. Arthur Rank Organisation) is a British entertainment Conglomerate (company), conglomerate founded in 1937 by industrialist J. Arthur Rank. It quickly became the largest and most vertical integration, ve ...

in London, England. Following that, Dorice made extensive tours of Europe, the Far East, the Orient and South America. Upon returning to Canada in 1963, she performed in multiple cabarets and hotets before going overseas to tour eleven nations, such as France, Japan and the United States. Dorice conducted her first tour for the

(CBC) in 1965, visiting worldwide bases of the

, so that she could entertain them. In March 1966, her first single was released by Elysée. Dorice presented the television program ''Comment allez-vous'' on the

from May 1966 to 1967. She went on to present the English-language program ''Le Caf' Conc'' between 1969 and 1970, on the

affiliate

CFCF-TV CFCF-DT (channel 12) is an English-language television station in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, part of the CTV Television Network. It is owned and operated by network parent Bell Media alongside Noovo flagship CFJP-DT (channel 35). The two statio ...

. On the show, Dorice performed weekly with a cabaret featuring "scantily-clad dancers, live singing, and an appreciative crowd" according to

CTV News CTV News is the news division of the CTV Television Network in Canada. The name ''CTV News'' is also applied as the title of local and regional newscasts on the network's owned-and-operated stations (O&Os), which are closely tied to the nationa ...

. She also made guest appearances on multiple programs on television and radio in Canada and the United States. In 1970, Dorice performed on ''

The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson ''The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson'' is an American television talk show broadcast by NBC. The show was the third installment of ''The Tonight Show''. Hosted by Johnny Carson, it aired from October 1, 1962 to May 22, 1992, replacing ''T ...

'' and also went on ''

The Carol Burnett Show ''The Carol Burnett Show'' is an American variety/sketch comedy television show that originally ran on CBS from September 11, 1967, to March 29, 1978, for 279 episodes, and again with nine episodes in fall 1991. It starred Carol Burnett, Harv ...

'' and ''

The Ed Sullivan Show ''The Ed Sullivan Show'' is an American television variety show that ran on CBS from June 20, 1948, to March 28, 1971, and was hosted by New York City, New York entertainment columnist Ed Sullivan. It was replaced in September 1971 by the ''CB ...

''. She founded the

-based artistic agency Les Productions Danièle Dorice Inc in 1971, and began to administer a music hall school in 1974, where Dorice taught dance, staging and voice. Dorice and her dance group Les Doricettes performed on cruise ships, in hotels in Montreal and in Florida, throughout the 1970s and the 1980s. She recorded the LP ''Danièle Dorice, la joie de vivre'' in 1971, and performed at the CBC Showcase '73 in the Saskatchewan Centre of the Arts in May 1973.

Artistry

Dorice was able to perform in nine different languages, including English, French, Greek, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, Russian and Spanish. Dan Lewis of ''The Record'' wrote that she did not speak the letter H in her vocabulary when she did not employ phonetic pronunciations. Lewis also noted Dorice "offers each song with the exuberance of a gay French mademoiselle on a sprightly walk along the banks of the

Seine The Seine ( , ) is a river in northern France. Its drainage basin is in the Paris Basin (a geological relative lowland) covering most of northern France. It rises at Source-Seine, northwest of Dijon in northeastern France in the Langres plat ...

, or along the Champs Elysee" and that there was "typical French warble in her songs".

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Dorice, Danièle 1935 births 2018 deaths Singers from Quebec Musicians from Quebec City French-language singers of Canada 20th-century Canadian women singers 21st-century Canadian women singers Canadian female dancers 20th-century Canadian educators 21st-century Canadian educators Canadian women educators Deaths from cancer in Quebec