Buddy Greco
b. Armando Greco, 14 August 1926, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. A singer and pianist whose strong suit has always been swinging, ultra-hip interpretations of classy songs. The son of a music critic who had his own radio show on station WPEN, Buddy himself appeared on WPEN at the age of five, initially making his mark as a singer and actor. Later on, like his two brothers, he studied to become a pianist, practising and playing at the Philadelphia Settlement House, a 10-block complex of recreational and hobby facilities, where so many of the city's youthful musicians congregated. Greco led his own trio during 1944-49, and recorded a major hit version of Carmen Lombardo's Ooh, Look-A There Ain't She Pretty, though the singer received only $32 for recording the single. Heard by Benny Goodman while playing at Philadelphia's Club 13, he was offered a job by the bandleader and subsequently became pianist-vocalist-arranger with the Goodman orchestra, appearing with Goodman's sextet at the London Palladium in 1949, embarking on several tours with the band and gracing such Goodman Capitol sides as It Isn't Fair, ‘Don't Worry Bout Me, ‘The Land of Oo-Bla-Dee’ and Brother Bill with his vocals. By 1951 Greco had become a solo act once more, gaining a regular spot on the BROADWAY OPEN HOUSE television show and providing Coral with a hit record in I Ran All The Way Home. He also won many lucrative nightclub engagements, one of which provided the best-selling album BUDDY GRECO AT MISTER KELLY'S, a superb document of his appearances at the Chicago club in 1955. Greco's biggest hit was still to come, a non-stop, grab-at-the-lyrics version of Richard Rodgersand Lorenz Hart's The Lady Is A Tramp, cut for Epic Records in 1960. This track sold over a million copies worldwide and gave Buddy his first UK chart entry. During the late '60s and '70s Greco became increasingly associated with the British showbusiness scene, playing dates at London's Talk Of The Town, appearing on the Royal Command Performance and cutting an instrumental album with the London Symphony Orchestra. This well-travelled and appreciated performer has claimed to have played every major club in the world on at least two occasions, and was still going round to some of them again in the late '80s. In the early '90s he re-established himself in Britain with well-received cabaret appearances at London's Café Royal.