Bio Full Biography »

Bette Midler counts singing as only one of her talents. Still, she has managed to score a number of major hits in a roller-coaster career as a recording artist. Born in Paterson, NJ, and raised in Hawaii, Midler showed an interest in singing and acting early on, and by the '60s, she had moved to New York and gotten a role in the long-running Broadway hit Fiddler on the Roof. Midler developed a nightclub act that included comedy and singing of a variety of kinds of material, including show tunes, pop hits, and even a takeoff on the Andrews Sisters, and appeared with increasing frequency in New York with her accompanist, Barry Manilow. She was signed to Atlantic Records and released The Divine Miss M (1972), which went gold and included a Top Ten single cover of the Andrews Sisters' "Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy." Bette Midler (1973) was similarly successful. Midler's album sales fell off during the rest of the '70s, though her records always reached the Top 100 in the album chart. But in 19...