list_text=          Cliff Edwards' uniquely ebullient voice won him the role as Jiminy Cricket in Pinocchio and resulted in one of the most inspirational of Disney songs, the Oscar-winning "When You Wish Upon A Star." 
          As film critic Leonard Maltin wrote for the Cliff Edwards CD, released under the Take Two label, "His casting as the voice of Jiminy Cricket has granted him a kind of immortality; what man, woman or child hasn't heard him sing 'When You Wish Upon a Star?'" 
          Born in Hannibal, Missouri, on June 14, 1895, Cliff ran away from home at 14, eventually landing in St. Louis, where he sang for nickels in saloons. He learned the ukulele and developed an unusual singing style that he called "eefin," where he created a kazoo-like sound with his elastic, three-octave range voice. And when a waiter couldn't remember his name, nicknaming him Ike, Cliff began to bill himself as "Ukulele Ike." 
          While living in Chicago and working with a pianist named Bobby Carleton, who wrote a song "Ja Da," the duo transformed it into one of the biggest hits of the 1920s. Almost overnight, Cliff became a favorite crooner recording such songs as "June Night".
          On the stages of New York, Cliff worked with many stars of the time, including stuttering comedian Joe Frisco at the Palace Theatre. In 1924, he stole the show in George Gershwin's Lady Be Good, starring Fred Astaire, when he introduced the song "Fascinatin' Rhythm," and later replaced Rudy Vallee as the star of George White's Scandals.
          In 1928, Cliff arrived in Los Angeles and signed a four-year contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, debuting in the Robert Montgomery feature So This Is College? He went on to introduce the song "Singin' in the Rain" in "The Hollywood Revue of 1929" and established himself as a bona fide film star, subsequently appearing in more than 100 motion pictures, including the classic Gone With the Wind with Clark Gable.
          After Pinocchio, Cliff encored the voice of Jiminy Cricket in such Disney films as Fun and Fancy Free in 1947. In the years that followed, either he (with his ukulele in hand) or his voice as Jiminy Cricket, were featured in more than 30 episodes of the popular television series The Mickey Mouse Club. Cliff also voiced one of the crows in the 1941 animated feature Dumbo, in which he introduced the infectious "When I See an Elephant Fly," and in 1956, recorded his final album Ukulele Ike Sings Again for the Disneyland label.
          Because of personal and health issues, his career slowed during the 1950s and '60s. Cliff Edwards died in Hollywood on July 17, 1971."&