Harry Lillis Crosby, 3 May 1903, Tacoma, Washington, USA, d. 14 October 1977, La Moraleja, Madrid, Spain. One of the most popular vocalists of all time, Crosby picked up his nickname through a childhood love of a strip-cartoon character in a local newspaper. After first singing with a jazz band at high school, he sang at university with a friend, Al Rinker. The duo decided t
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Orvin Gene Autry, 29 September 1907, near Tioga, Texas, USA, d. 2 October 1998, Studio City, California, USA. The eldest of four children of Delbert Autry, a poor tenant farmer, who moved his family many times over the years, before eventually arriving at Ravia, Oklahoma. His grandfather, a Baptist minister, taught him to sing when he was a child so that he could perform in
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John Royce Mathis, 30 September 1935, San Francisco, California, USA. In 1956, the 19-year-old Mathis was signed to Columbia Records where he began his career with a jazz-tinged album. A US Top 20 hit with ‘Wonderful! Wonderful!’ saw him move adroitly towards the balladeer market, and before long he was a major concert attraction, with regular appearances on highly
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Howard Andrew Williams, 3 December 1928, Wall Lake, Iowa, USA. Williams began his singing career in the local church choir with his three brothers. The quartet became popular on their own radio shows from Cincinnati, Des Moines and Chicago. They backed Bing Crosby on his Oscar-winning ‘Swinging On A Star’, from the 1944 movie Going My Way, and in the same year appe
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15 August 1933, Bloomington, Indiana, USA, d. 19 June 1997, Martinsville, Indiana, USA. Helms was something of a child prodigy, who was playing guitar and singing a mixture of pop and country on local radio at the age of 12, and from 1946-54, he regularly appeared on WWTV Bloomington. He made his debut on the Grand Ole Opry in 1950, having impressed WSM officials so much tha
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Darlene Wright, 26 July 1938, Los Angeles, California, USA. A prolific vocalist, Love began her career in 1957 as a founder member of the Blossoms. This influential girl-group not only enjoyed an extensive recording career in its own right, but also appeared on scores of sessions and as the resident singers on US television’s Shindig! Love also enjoyed a fruitful associ
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Brenda Mae Tarpley, 11 December 1944, Lithonia, Georgia, USA. Even in early adolescence, Lee had an adult husk of a voice that could slip from anguished intimacy through sleepy insinuation to raucous lust, even during ‘Let’s Jump The Broomstick’, ‘Speak To Me Pretty’ and other jaunty classics that kept her in the hit parade from the mid-50s to 1965.
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Pierino Como, 18 May 1912, Canonsburg, Pennsylvania, USA, d. 12 May 2001, Jupiter Inlet Beach Colony, Florida, USA. Como was an accomplished popular singer with a warm baritone voice, whose repertoire included ballads, novelty numbers and singalongs. Born into a large Italian-American family in Canonsburg, he left his home town barber shop in 1933 and toured with the local b
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Katherine LaVerne Starks, 21 July 1922, Dougherty, Oklahoma, USA. While she was still a child, Starr’s family moved to Dallas, Texas, where she made her professional debut on local radio before she had left school. In 1939 she was hired briefly by Glenn Miller when his regular singer, Marion Hutton, was sick. Starr made records with Miller, but was soon on the move. She
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José Montserrate Feliciano García, 10 September 1945, Lares, Puerto Rico. After early fame as a flamenco-style interpreter of pop and rock material, Feliciano turned more to mainstream Latin music, becoming one of the most popular artists in the Spanish-speaking world. He was born blind and as a child moved to New York’s Spanish Harlem. He learned guitar a
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Dino Paul Crocetti, 7 June 1917, Steubenville, Ohio, USA, d. 25 December 1995, Beverly Hills, California, USA. An extremely popular ballad singer and light comedian with a relaxed and easy style, who developed into an accomplished dramatic actor. After leaving school in the tenth grade, he worked as a shoe-shine boy and a gas station attendant before becoming an ‘amateu
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Nathaniel Adams Coles, 17 March 1919 (although 1916 and 1917 have also been cited), Montgomery, Alabama, USA, d. 15 February 1965, Santa Monica, California, USA. Cole was born into a family that was both deeply religious and intensely musical. He learned to play piano at home when only four years old through his mother, Perlina Adams Coles, and, later, played organ at the ch
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