Broadway actor and singer, 89

NEW YORK — Barbara Cook, whose shimmering soprano made her one of Broadway’s leading ingenues and later a major cabaret and concert interpreter of popular American song, has died. She was 89.

Cook died early Tuesday of respiratory failure at her home in Manhattan, surrounded by family and friends, according to publicist Amanda Kaus. Her last meal was vanilla ice cream, a nod to one of her most famous roles in “She Loves Me.”

On Broadway, Cook was best known for three roles: her portrayal of the saucy Cunegonde in Leonard Bernstein’s “Candide” (1956); librarian Marian opposite Robert Preston in “The Music Man” (1957); and Amalia Balash, the letter-writing heroine of “She Loves Me” (1963).

Yet when Cook’s pert ingenue days were over, she found a second, longer career in clubs and concert halls, working for more than 30 years with Wally Harper, a pianist and music arranger.

In 2011, she was saluted at the Kennedy Center Honors and remained a singer even in her 80s.

“Of course, I think I’ve gotten better at it,” she said in an interview with The Associated Press in her Manhattan home in 2011. “As the years go by, I have more and more courage to go deeper and deeper and deeper.”

Cook appeared in a pair of Rodgers and Hammerstein classics, playing Ado Annie in a City Center revival of “Oklahoma!” and then on tour in 1953. She followed that by portraying Carrie Pipperidge in a 1954 revival of “Carousel.” It led to Cook’s first original musical success, a yearlong Broadway run in “Plain and Fancy” (1955), in which she portrayed an innocent, unworldly Amish girl.

The following year, she starred in “Candide,” which ran only 73 performances but later became a staple of opera houses around the world.

“The Music Man” was Cook’s biggest Broadway hit, opening in December 1957 and running for more than 1,300 performances. She won a Tony Award for her portrayal of the prim librarian who realizes Professor Harold Hill (Preston) is a con man.

Her marriage to acting teacher David LeGrant ended in divorce. Cook is survived by a son, Adam LeGrant.