Frankie Laine, one of the great post-war vocalists, died on 6th Feb. 2007

Frankie Laine was born Francesco LoVecchio in Chicago on March 30th 1913. His parents had emigrated from Sicily, and his father was at one time Al Capone's personal barber. He was one of the many great post-war vocalists to emerge from the Italian-American community, but he was not a crooner in the Como/Bennett tradition. He was one of the first singers to bring black R&B influences into the mainstream of pop vocal styling, and his first big hit "That's My Desire" in 1946, was one of the records that signalled the impending decline of the big band crooner genre. His was no instant rise to stardom, however - he had had a number of false starts, and his break only came eventually when Hoagy Carmichael saw him performing one of his songs in an LA club. He signed to Mercury and went on to have a lengthy string of hits through the late 40s and 50s, with records ranging from dramatic ballads to western movie and TV themes produced under the guidance of legendary A&R man Mitch Miller, with whom he moved to Columbia in 1951. He had no less than 39 US chart hits with Columbia. He lived to the ripe old age of 93, and died in Los Angeles in 2007. His records remain perennially popular around the world, especially in the UK, where he had some of the biggest hits of the 50s. Acrobat has a collection of some of his best-known repertoire on catalogue - for details click here.