Crooner’s voice loved by Sinatra
VIC DAMONE had the “best pair of pipes in the business,” according to none other than Frank Sinatra. But behind that clear and pleasant voice was a more complicated life than anyone could have imagined.
Damone had connections to the Mafia and after breaking off his engagement to a mobster’s daughter was held dangling out of a window in New York. He also incurred large gambling debts and was arrested for kidnapping his nine-year-old son.
Four times divorced and five times married, at one point bankrupt, he was also offered the role of the singer Johnny Fontane in The Godfather. He turned it down for a number of reasons, including a wish to avoid offending Sinatra on whom the character was thought to be based.
Vito Rocco Farinola was born into an Italian neighbourhood in Brooklyn to Mamie (née Damone) and Rocco, one son amid four daughters. Mamie was a pianist and it was from her, not his electrician father, that Vito sought inspiration, although after leaving Lafayette High School he became an usher at Paramount Theatre in New York.
When singer Perry Como entered the lift one day Vito stopped it and asked him to listen to him sing. Como encouraged him and introduced him to a local bandleader. Vito adopted the name Vic Damone and later named his eldest child Perry. As for his style, “Sure, I copied Sinatra, who didn’t?” he said.
Success came quickly for the singer. He performed well on a radio talent show in 1946 and a year later had his first hit I Have But One Heart, sung in English and Italian.
Many more hits followed, as well as a burgeoning film career with the musicals Rich, Young And Pretty and The Strip.
During the Korean War he entertained the troops, touring in Germany, and followed that up with two major musicals, Hit The Deck and Kismet. He then had a major success with the single On The Street Where You Live from My Fair Lady which also became a UK No 1.
Changing tastes in pop music saw him shift his focus to TV in the 1960s and he later started playing Las Vegas, the earnings from which helped him pay off his bankruptcy.
His final album came in 2002 although others were repackaged and rereleased. That year he also suffered a stroke and retired.
However he did come out of retirement for a one-off sell-out show in 2011. He said: “I don’t need the money... but my six grandkids have never seen me on stage.”
His first wife Pier Angeli left James Dean for him, his second, Judith Rawlins, bore him three daughters. His final marriage was to Rena Rowan-Damone, which lasted from 1998 to her death in 2016.
He died from complications of a respiratory illness, and his three daughters and six grandchildren survive him. His son Perry died aged 59 of lymphoma in 2014.