Ricky Valance
Ricky Valance (born April 10, 1936 as David Spencer in Ynysddu , South Wales ; † June 12, 2020 ) was a British pop singer .
Live and act
The Welsh singer David Spencer performed under the name Ricky Valance from the late 1950s, mainly in smaller clubs. It was produced by Norrie Paramor , and provocatively it was given the stage name "Ricky Valance", which was supposed to commemorate Ritchie Valens , who had a tragic accident a year and a half earlier with Buddy Holly and the Big Bopper .
There were a number of successful songs about death in the 1950s and early 1960s. Because the British broadcaster BBC refused to play these songs on the radio for moral reasons, US hits like Leader of the Pack by the Shangri-Las and Teen Angel by Mark Dinning had a hard time on the island; others weren't even published there. Even Ray Peterson with his song Tell Laura I Love Her , 1960, a top 10 hit in the US, was not in the UK in the first place at the start. The song is about a crashed racing driver whose last words are: "Tell Laura that I love her". It was written by successful composer Jeff Barry , whose first big hit it was, and Ben Raleigh . But it was quite common at the time for songs for other countries to be re-recorded and published by other artists, and so EMI dared what Decca had not dared. Eventually, Ricky Valance was selected as the singer for the song.
The single was boycotted by the BBC, as expected, but its broadcast on Radio Luxembourg's UK service on medium and long wave nonetheless made it so popular that it rose to number 1 in Great Britain in September 1960 . He was the first Welshman to score a number one hit in the British charts as a solo singer. But after 16 weeks the chart history of Spencer-Valance in his home country was already over. With Movin 'Away he still had a big hit in Scandinavia, Australia and South Africa, but neither with that nor with any of his other seven singles did he make it into the UK charts again. So he returned to the clubs where his career began. He last published the single Welcome Home in 2017 for charitable purposes .
Valance suffered from dementia and died in hospital on June 12, 2020. Most recently, he lived with his wife in Skegness in the county of Lincolnshire .
Discography
| year | Title B side |
Top ranking, total weeks, awardChartsChart placements (Year, title, B-side , rankings, weeks, awards, notes) |
Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|
 UK
|
|||
| 1960 | Tell Laura I Love Her Once Upon a Time |
UK1 (16 weeks) UK |
|
| Movin 'Away Lipstick On Your Lips |
- | ||
| 1961 | I Never Had a Chance It's Not True |
- | |
| Only The Young Jimmy’s Girl |
- | ||
| Bobby I Want To Fall In Love |
- | ||
| Fisherboy Why Can't We |
- | ||
| 1962 | Try To Forget Her At Times Like These |
- | |
| Don't Play No. 9 till the final curtain falls |
- | ||
| 1965 | Six Boys A Face In The Crowd |
- | |
| 1978 | Walking In The Sunshine Hello Mary Lou |
- | |
| 1988 | Daddy's Little Girl Ticket To Dream |
- |
literature
- The Guinness Book of 500 Number One Hits - ISBN 0-85112-250-7 .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ According to our own information in 1939
- ↑ Help Ricky Valance raise a million pounds for the RAF, accessed June 13, 2020
- ↑ Singer Ricky Valance dies aged 84 . In: BBC News . June 12, 2020 ( bbc.com [accessed June 13, 2020]).
- ↑ Singer Ricky Valance dies aged 84 . In: BBC News . June 12, 2020 ( bbc.com [accessed June 13, 2020]).
- ↑ Chart sources: UK
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Valance, Ricky |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Spencer, David (real name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Welsh pop singer |
| DATE OF BIRTH | April 10, 1936 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Ynysddu , Wales |
| DATE OF DEATH | June 12, 2020 |
| Place of death | Skegness , Lincolnshire |