Gerard W. Kenny (born July 8, 1947, New York City, United States) is an American singer-songwriter, based in London, England. In 1981, he received the Ivor Novello Award for Best Television Theme Music for his song "I Could Be So Good for You", the theme tune of the ITV series ''
Minder''.
Career
Kenny formed his first band whilst in high school and between then and the early 1970s, he toured the
club circuit. In 1968, he landed his first recording contract with
Warner Bros. Records, and from that point until 1977 issued a number of singles that failed to break the
charts
A chart (sometimes known as a graph) is a graphical representation for data visualization, in which "the data is represented by symbols, such as bars in a bar chart, lines in a line chart, or slices in a pie chart". A chart can represent tabu ...
. He also recorded for Buddah and Laurie; one of the singles on the latter titled "Happiest Man" is now collectable, selling for up to £200.
Kenny relocated to London in 1977 and it was not until the following year that he scored his first
hit single
A hit song, also known as a hit record, hit single or simply a hit, is a recorded song or instrumental that becomes broadly popular or well-known. Although ''hit song'' means any widely played or big-selling song, the specific term ''hit record' ...
with "
New York, New York (So Good They Named It Twice)" (an ode to his hometown), which spent two months on the
UK Singles Chart
The UK Singles Chart (currently titled Official Singles Chart, with the upper section more commonly known as the Official UK Top 40) is compiled by the Official Charts Company (OCC), on behalf of the British record industry, listing the top-s ...
, with its parent album ''Made It Through the Rain'' going top 20 the following year. Another single on the
RCA label, "Fantasy", proved to be another chart hit in 1980, which is from Kenny's second album ''Living on Music'', released the same year. The album saw success in the
Philippines
The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no),
* bik, Republika kan Filipinas
* ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas
* cbk, República de Filipinas
* hil, Republ ...
, and its lead single "Getting to Know Each Other" became a hit on local radio stations and was featured as a soundtrack in several films and TV shows within the country. It was later
covered
Cover or covers may refer to:
Packaging
* Another name for a lid
* Cover (philately), generic term for envelope or package
* Album cover, the front of the packaging
* Book cover or magazine cover
** Book design
** Back cover copy, part of copy ...
by local artists
Ariel Rivera,
Xian Lim,
Billy Crawford,
Sharon Cuneta and DK Tijam. "Fantasy" was also covered by
Regine Velasquez.
Kenny's composition "I Could Be So Good for You" was recorded by
Dennis Waterman for the
theme tune of the
ITV series ''
Minder'' and became a
top 10 hit
Hit means to strike someone or something.
Hit or HIT may also refer to:
Arts, entertainment and media Fictional entities
* Hit, a fictional character from '' Dragon Ball Super''
* Homicide International Trust, or HIT, a fictional organization ...
single in the United Kingdom during 1980. It also gained an
Ivor Novello Award for Kenny. In a 2021 interview, he spoke about the composition and reception of the song and how he met Waterman.
In 1983, he began to work with
Alan Jay Lerner
Alan Jay Lerner (August 31, 1918 – June 14, 1986) was an American lyricist and librettist. In collaboration with Frederick Loewe, and later Burton Lane, he created some of the world's most popular and enduring works of musical theatre b ...
on a musical adaption of ''
My Man Godfrey
''My Man Godfrey'' is a 1936 American screwball comedy film directed by Gregory La Cava and starring William Powell and Carole Lombard, who had been briefly married years before appearing together in the film. The screenplay for ''My Man Godf ...
'', but Lerner died before it could be completed. However, two of the songs the pair had composed for this musical, namely "I've Been Married" and "Some People", later appeared on Kenny's album ''The Time Between the Time'' a decade later. Also this year, Kenny worked for
Spike Milligan as the musical director for his show ''Spike Milligan and Friends'', which toured across Australia. In 1985, after moving to
WEA, Kenny charted in the UK with another theme song, "No Man's Land", from the ITV drama series ''
Widows''.
Since then, Kenny has continued to record and release music periodically. His songs have been recorded by
Barry Manilow
Barry Manilow (born Barry Alan Pincus; June 17, 1943) is an American singer and songwriter with a career that spans seven decades. His hit recordings include " Could It Be Magic", " Somewhere Down the Road", " Mandy", " I Write the Songs", " C ...
,
Johnny Mathis
John Royce Mathis (born September 30, 1935) is an American singer of popular music. Starting his career with singles of standard music, he became highly popular as an album artist, with several dozen of his albums achieving gold or platinum s ...
,
Perry Como
Pierino Ronald "Perry" Como (; May 18, 1912 – May 12, 2001) was an Italian-American singer, actor and television personality. During a career spanning more than half a century, he recorded exclusively for RCA Victor for 44 years, after signin ...
,
Jack Jones Jack Jones may refer to:
Arts and entertainment Music
*Jack Jones (American singer) (born 1938), American jazz and pop singer
*Jack Jones, stage name of Australian singer Irwin Thomas (born 1971)
*Jack Jones (Welsh musician) (born 1992), Welsh mu ...
,
Marion Montgomery,
Sacha Distel,
James Last and
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 vocalist ...
, who recorded a song that he co-wrote with
Lynsey de Paul, called "
There's No Place Like London". Other notable songs co-written by Kenny and de Paul include "Just a Little Time", the title track from de Paul's
1994 album and "Take Back Your Heartache" which appeared on Kenny's 1995 album, ''An Evening with Gerard Kenny Live''.
Selected discography
Albums
*''Made It Through the Rain'' (1979) –
UK No. 19
*''Living on Music'' (1980)
*''City Living'' (1981)
*''The Music of Gerard Kenny'' (1984)
*''All for a Dream'' (1984)
*''Play Me Some Porter Please'' (1992)
*''The Time Between Time'' (1994)
*''An Evening with Gerard Kenny Live'' (1995)
*''The Best of... The Singles'' (1998)
*''Coming Home'' (2005)
Singles
*"Where Are You?" (1967)
*"3 Weeks, 4 Days, 15 Hours" (1967)
*"Leave It to Me" (1968)
*"
New York, New York (So Good They Named It Twice)" (1978) -
UK No. 43
*"D-D-D-Dancing" (1979)
*"Getting to Know Each Other" (1980)
*"Fantasy" (1980) – UK No. 34
*"The Other Woman, The Other Man" (1984) – UK No. 69
*"No Man's Land" (1985) – UK No. 56
References
External links
Gerard Kenny's official website*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kenny, Gerard
1947 births
Living people
American expatriates in England
American male singer-songwriters
Singer-songwriters from New York (state)
American pop pianists
American male pianists
American tenors
RCA Records artists
Ivor Novello Award winners
20th-century American pianists