Charles Blackwell (music Arranger)
Charles Blackwell (born 20 May 1940) is an English arranger, record producer and songwriter. Career Born in London, Blackwell taught himself to play the piano and to write arrangements. He started working as an arranger with record producer Joe Meek at the age of eighteen, and became one of the most prolific studio arrangers and record producers of the 1960s and 1970s, with a string of hit records to his credit, including " Johnny Remember Me" by John Leyton; " What's New Pussycat", " I'll Never Fall in Love Again" by Tom Jones; and " Release Me", "A Man Without Love" by Engelbert Humperdinck. In addition, he was involved in the recordings of "Hold Me" for P.J. Proby, and in a number of hits by Kathy Kirby, including " Secret Love". Blackwell also regularly arranged and conducted studio recordings for francophone artists, including Art Sullivan, Michel Polnareff ("Love Me Please Love Me"), and Françoise Hardy ("Je Veux Qu'il Revienne" / "Only You Can Do It"). He composed ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Pop Music
Pop music is a genre of popular music that originated in its modern form during the mid-1950s in the United States and the United Kingdom. The terms ''popular music'' and ''pop music'' are often used interchangeably, although the former describes all music that is popular and includes many disparate styles. During the 1950s and 1960s, pop music encompassed rock and roll and the youth-oriented styles it influenced. ''Rock'' and ''pop'' music remained roughly synonymous until the late 1960s, after which ''pop'' became associated with music that was more commercial, ephemeral, and accessible. Although much of the music that appears on record charts is considered to be pop music, the genre is distinguished from chart music. Identifying factors usually include repeated choruses and hooks, short to medium-length songs written in a basic format (often the verse-chorus structure), and rhythms or tempos that can be easily danced to. Much pop music also borrows elements from other styles ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Shirley Bassey
Dame Shirley Veronica Bassey (; born 8 January 1937) is a Welsh singer. Best known for her career longevity, powerful voice and recording the theme songs to three James Bond films, Bassey is widely regarded as one of the most popular vocalists in Britain. Born in Cardiff, Bassey began performing as a teenager in 1953. In 1959, she became the first Welsh person to gain a number-one single on the UK Singles Chart. In the following decades, Bassey amassed 27 Top 40 hits in the UK, including two number-ones. She became well-known for recording the soundtrack theme songs of the James Bond films '' Goldfinger'' (1964), '' Diamonds Are Forever'' (1971), and '' Moonraker'' (1979). In 2020, Bassey became the first female artist to chart an album in the Top 40 of the UK Albums Chart in seven consecutive decades with her album ''I Owe It All To You''. Bassey has also had numerous BBC television specials, and she hosted her own variety series, '' Shirley Bassey''. In 2011, BBC aired the t ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Gene Pitney
Gene Francis Alan Pitney (February 17, 1940 – April 5, 2006) was an American singer-songwriter and musician. Pitney charted 16 top-40 hits in the United States, four in the top ten. In the United Kingdom, he had 22 top-40 hit singles, including 11 in the top ten. Among his most famous hits are "Town Without Pity", "(The Man Who Shot) Liberty Valance", "Twenty Four Hours from Tulsa", " I'm Gonna Be Strong", " It Hurts to Be in Love", and "Something's Gotten Hold of My Heart". He also wrote the early-1960s hits "Rubber Ball" recorded by Bobby Vee, "Hello Mary Lou" by Ricky Nelson, and " He's a Rebel" by the Crystals. In 2002, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Early years Pitney was born in Hartford, Connecticut, United States, the son of Anna A. (Orlowski) and Harold F. Pitney. The third of five children of a lathe operator, Pitney lived with his family in Rockville, Connecticut, during his formative years. He grew up in Rockville, now part of Vernon, Conne ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Dionne Warwick
Marie Dionne Warwick (; born December 12, 1940) is an American singer, actress, and television host. Warwick ranks among the 40 biggest U.S. hit makers between 1955 and 1999, based on her chart history on ''Billboard'''s Hot 100 pop singles chart. She is the second-most charted female vocalist during the rock era (1955–1999). She is also one of the most-charted vocalists of all time, with 56 of her singles making the Hot 100 between 1962 and 1998 (12 of them Top Ten), and 80 singles in total – either solo or collaboratively – making the Hot 100, R&B and/or adult contemporary charts. Dionne ranks #74 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100's "Greatest Artists of all time". During her career, she has sold more than 100 million records worldwide and she has won many awards, including six Grammy Awards. Warwick has been inducted into the Hollywood Walk of Fame, the Grammy Hall of Fame, the R&B Music Hall of Fame and the Apollo Theater Walk of Fame. In 2019 she won the Grammy Lifetim ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Bobby Goldsboro
Robert Charles Goldsboro (born January 18, 1941) is an American pop and country singer and songwriter. He had a string of pop and country hits in the 1960s and 1970s, including his signature No. 1 hit "Honey", which sold over 1 million copies in the United States, and the UK top-10 single "Summer (The First Time)". Goldsboro starred in his own television show, ''The Bobby Goldsboro Show'', from 1973 to 1976. He also created the children's series '' The Swamp Critters of Lost Lagoon''. Early life Goldsboro was born in Marianna, Florida. During his first year of life, his family moved north from Marianna to Dothan, Alabama. He learned to play the ukelele when he was around 12 years old before learning to play the guitar. He was interested in becoming a professional baseball player before turning his interest to music. Goldsboro attended Dothan High School. In his senior year in high school he started playing in a band called The Webbs. After graduating from high school in 1959, ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Slim Whitman
Ottis Dewey Whitman Jr. (January 20, 1923 – June 19, 2013), known as Slim Whitman, was an American country music singer-songwriter and guitarist known for his yodeling abilities and his use of falsetto. He claimed he had sold in excess of 120 million records, although the recorded sales figures give 70 million, during a career that spanned over seven decades, and consisted of a prolific output of over 100 albums and around 500 recorded songs, that not only consisted of country music, but also of contemporary gospel, Broadway show tunes, love songs and standards. In the 1950s, Whitman toured with Elvis Presley as the opening act. In the 1990s and 2000s, a new generation was exposed to Whitman through his songs featured in the film ''Mars Attacks!''. His "Indian Love Call" (listened to by the elderly character played by veteran actress Sylvia Sidney) would kill the invading Martians by causing their heads to explode every time the record was played. This proves the key to ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Vera Lynn
Dame Vera Margaret Lynn (; 20 March 191718 June 2020) was an English singer and entertainer whose musical recordings and performances were very popular during World War II. She is honorifically known as the " Forces' Sweetheart", having given outdoor concerts for the troops in Egypt, India and Burma during the war as part of the Entertainments National Service Association (ENSA). The songs most associated with her include "We'll Meet Again", " (There'll Be Bluebirds Over) The White Cliffs of Dover", "A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square" and "There'll Always Be an England". She remained popular after the war, appearing on radio and television in the United Kingdom and the United States, and recording such hits as "Auf Wiederseh'n, Sweetheart" and her UK number-one single "My Son, My Son". Her last single, "I Love This Land", was released to mark the end of the Falklands War. In 2009, at the age of 92, she became the oldest living artist to top the UK Albums Chart with the ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Lulu (singer)
Lulu Kennedy-Cairns (born Marie McDonald McLaughlin Lawrie; 3 November 1948) is a Scottish singer, actress, and television personality. Noted for her powerful singing voice,Lulu, ''I Don't Want to Fight'', Time Warner Books, 2002. p. 214 Lulu began her career in the UK but soon became known internationally. She had major chart hits with "To Sir with Love" from the 1967 film of the same name, which topped the ''Billboard'' Hot 100, and with the title song to the 1974 James Bond film '' The Man with the Golden Gun''. In European countries, she is also widely known for the Eurovision Song Contest 1969 winning entry "Boom Bang-a-Bang", and for her 1964 hit " Shout", which she performed at the closing ceremony of the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow. Life and career Marie McDonald McLaughlin Lawrie was born in Lennoxtown, Stirlingshire, and grew up in Dennistoun, Glasgow, where she attended Thomson Street Primary School and Onslow Drive School. She lived in Gallowgate for a ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Brigitte Bardot
Brigitte Anne-Marie Bardot ( ; ; born 28 September 1934), often referred to by her initials B.B., is a former French actress, singer and model. Famous for portraying sexually emancipated characters with hedonistic lifestyles, she was one of the best known sex symbols of the 1950s and 1960s. Although she withdrew from the entertainment industry in 1973, she remains a major popular culture icon. Born and raised in Paris, Bardot was an aspiring ballerina in her early life. She started her acting career in 1952. She achieved international recognition in 1957 for her role in '' And God Created Woman'' (1956), and also caught the attention of French intellectuals. She was the subject of Simone de Beauvoir's 1959 essay ''The Lolita Syndrome'', which described her as a "locomotive of women's history" and built upon existentialist themes to declare her the first and most liberated woman of post-war France. She won a 1961 David di Donatello Best Foreign Actress Award for her work in ''Th ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Paul Anka
Paul Albert Anka (born July 30, 1941) is a Canadian-American singer, songwriter and actor. He is best known for his signature hit songs including " Diana", " Lonely Boy", "Put Your Head on My Shoulder", and " (You're) Having My Baby". Anka also wrote the theme for ''The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson''; one of Tom Jones' biggest hits, "She's a Lady"; and the English lyrics to Claude François and Jacques Revaux's music for Frank Sinatra's signature song "My Way", which has been recorded by many, including Elvis Presley. He co-wrote three songs with Michael Jackson: " This Is It" (originally titled "I Never Heard") "Love Never Felt So Good", and "Don't Matter to Me", which became posthumous hits for Jackson in 2009, 2014, and 2018, respectively. Early life Anka was born in Ottawa, Ontario, to Camelia (née Tannis) and Andrew Emile "Andy" Anka Sr., who owned a restaurant called the Locanda. His parents were both of Levantine descent. His father came to Canada from Bab Tum ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Marlene Dietrich
Marie Magdalene "Marlene" DietrichBorn as Maria Magdalena, not Marie Magdalene, according to Dietrich's biography by her daughter, Maria Riva ; however Dietrich's biography by Charlotte Chandler cites "Marie Magdalene" as her birth name . (, ; 27 December 1901 – 6 May 1992) was a German and American actress and singer whose career spanned from the 1910s to the 1980s. In 1920s Berlin, Dietrich performed on the stage and in silent films. Her performance as Lola-Lola in Josef von Sternberg's ''The Blue Angel'' (1930) brought her international acclaim and a contract with Paramount Pictures. She starred in many Hollywood films, including six iconic roles directed by Sternberg: ''Morocco'' (1930) (her only Academy Award nomination), ''Dishonored'' (1931), '' Shanghai Express'' and ''Blonde Venus'' (both 1932), ''The Scarlet Empress'' (1934) and '' The Devil Is a Woman'' (1935), ''Desire'' (1936) and ''Destry Rides Again'' (1939). She successfully traded on her glamorous persona a ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Adam Faith
Terence Nelhams Wright (23 June 1940 – 8 March 2003), known as Adam Faith, was an English singer, actor, and financial journalist. A teen idol, he scored consecutive No. 1 hits on the UK Singles Chart with "What Do You Want?" (1959) and "Poor Me" (1960). He became the first UK artist to lodge his initial seven hits in the top 5, and was ultimately one of the most charted acts of the 1960s. He was also one of the first UK acts to record original songs regularly. Faith also maintained an acting career, appearing as Dave in the teen exploitation film ''Beat Girl'' (1960), the eponymous lead in the ITV television series '' Budgie'' (1971–1972) and Frank Carver in the BBC comedy drama ''Love Hurts'' (1992–1994). Early life and education Terence Nelhams Wright was born on 23 June 1940 at 4, East Churchfield Road, Acton, Middlesex (now London), England, son of coach driver Alfred Richard Nelhams and cleaner Ellen May (née Burridge), formerly wife of Cecil G. Wright, from whom ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |