ABSTRACT
This chapter determines that girl singers and their music have a great deal to tell us about the complex social histories of gender in the UK and the US. It encounters girl singers' multiple modes of masquerade: their motivations and effects, how they conceal and reveal certain constructions of femininity, and whose interests are served. Many a feminist and queer theorist have found Joan Riviere's highly influential essay from 1929, "Womanliness as a Masquerade," a useful starting point for theorizing female femininity and performance. In other words, vocal masquerade played a leading role in the girl singers' musical achievements. The particular analyses of vocal masquerade reveal the deeply embedded racism, sexism and homophobia in the public perceptions and critical evaluations of these girl singers. Such vocal masquerades point to the fraught relationship between agency and constraint as it functioned for the girl singers within the popular music industry and among their audiences.
