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Best Known For
Tony Bennett is an American jazz vocalist, best known for performing standards and his signature song, "I Left My Heart in San Francisco."
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Louis Armstrong - Tony Bennett Paints Satchmo
Hanging in Louis Armstrong's den is a painting of Satchmo done by famed singer Tony Bennett, a lifelong fan of Louis Armstrong.
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Play NowTony Bennett. (2013). The Biography Channel website. Retrieved 10:31, May 24, 2013, from http://www.biography.com/people/tony-bennett-9926699.
Tony Bennett. [Internet]. 2013. The Biography Channel website. Available from: http://www.biography.com/people/tony-bennett-9926699 [Accessed 24 May 2013].
"Tony Bennett." 2013. The Biography Channel website. May 24 2013, 10:31 http://www.biography.com/people/tony-bennett-9926699.
"Tony Bennett," The Biography Channel website, 2013, http://www.biography.com/people/tony-bennett-9926699 [accessed May 24, 2013].
"Tony Bennett," The Biography Channel website, http://www.biography.com/people/tony-bennett-9926699 (accessed May 24, 2013).
Tony Bennett [Internet]. The Biography Channel website; 2013 [cited 2013 May 24] Available from: http://www.biography.com/people/tony-bennett-9926699.
Tony Bennett, http://www.biography.com/people/tony-bennett-9926699 (last visited May 24, 2013).
Tony Bennett. The Biography Channel website. 2013. Available at: http://www.biography.com/people/tony-bennett-9926699. Accessed May 24, 2013.
Synopsis
Tony Bennett was born in Astoria, Queens, New York, on August 3, 1926. Bennett had hit first hit, "Because of You," in 1951, and made a career singing standards including his signature song, "I Left My Heart in San Francisco." Bennett's career waned in the mid-1960s, as rock music became dominant, but rebounded in the 1990s.
Early Life
Bennett grew up in a poor family, in circumstances made more difficult by the Depression and by the death of his father when he was nine. While he attended the High School for the Industrial Arts in New York City, Bennett began working as a singing waiter. After serving in the Army infantry during World War II, he took advantage of the G.I. Bill and studied singing and acting at the American Theatre Wing. During this period his vocal coach Mimi Spear offered some advice that he took to heart: don't imitate other singers, emulate instrumentalists instead.
Early Hits
The young singer was discovered by Pearl Bailey in Greenwich Village and subsequently hired by Bob Hope in 1949. Hope advised him to take the name Tony Bennett (rather than the name he had been using, Joe Bari) and put him in his road show. Bennett told Billboard in 1997, "I've been on the road ever since." He signed with Columbia Records in 1950 and started working with record producer Mitch Miller. His early hits included "Rags To Riches," "Because of You," and "Stranger in Paradise." His most famous song, "I Left My Heart in San Francisco," was released in 1962 as a B-side on a single; it also earned Bennett his first Grammy award.
Professional and Personal Struggles
Bennett's success led to some artistic differences between the singer and his record company. His interest in singing quality material made him want to try new songs and new kinds of music. Columbia, however, wanted to repeat the style of his early hits. For some time, Bennett and Miller compromised by each selecting one half of the material to be recorded. After 20 years of recording with Columbia, however, he was told not to do any new songs. Company management wanted Bennett to cover top ten hits. Soon thereafter, Bennett ended his relationship with the company, formed his own label, and recorded on others. Bennett ended up taking a long hiatus from recording, staying away from the studios for some ten years before he made the 1986 album The Art of Excellence.
Bennett's break from recording coincided with some difficult times for the singer. He moved to California in the late 1970s and began using cocaine and marijuana, drugs that were an integral part of the celebrity party scene. A near death experience passing out in the bath tub and the memory of Lenny Bruce's drug-related death scared Bennett into changing his habits. Bennett was also struggling with a change in the public's taste in popular music, with the increased dominance of rock and roll. When he began his career, pop music appealed to all ages. Bennett asserts that young listeners were being taught that rock music belonged exclusively to their generation and that this alienated children from their parents.
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