The Way You Look Tonight, Body and Soul, and (I Left My Heart) In San Francisco are just a few of Tony Bennett’s well-known songs.
Additionally, he worked with well-known musicians such as Lady Gaga, Aretha Franklin, and Frank Sinatra, who referred to him as “the best singer in the business”.
The crooner sold millions of records over the course of his eight-decade career and took home 20 Grammys, including a lifetime achievement award.
The star’s fellow duo partner, Elton John, led the tributes, writing on Twitter: “So sad to learn of Tony’s demise. The classiest voice, man, and performer you will ever witness, Tony Bennett, the legendary US singer, has passed away at age 96. I adored and cherished him. ‘The best singer in the industry,’ according to Tony Bennett his publicist Sylvia Weiner informed the Associated Press in a statement that he had passed away.
She claimed that he passed away in his native New York. Although there was no known cause of death, Bennett had received an Alzheimer’s disease diagnosis in 2016.
One of the people paying respect to Tony Bennett on Twitter was the singer Paul Young, who wrote: “Ahhh, RIP Tony Bennett, truly one of the greats. A fantastic performer; I frequently watched him.
Tony Bennett was the last of his type and a master of the American songbook, wrote Star Trek actor George Takei in a post.From Sinatra to Lady Gaga, he may have left his heart in San Francisco, but he still has all of our hearts. Tony, be at peace and start singing to us from the stars.
Nile Rogers, a musician, continued, “My deepest sympathies are extended to Tony Bennett’s family and friends.”
Bennett was referred to as a “true talent, a true gentleman, and a true friend” by former US first lady Hillary Clinton. She wrote on Twitter, “We’ll miss you, Tony, and thanks for all the memories.”
Bennett, who was raised in squalor by his Italian immigrant family and was born Anthony Dominick Benedetto, died when he was barely 10 years old.
Before enrolling in the School of Industrial Art in New York to study music and painting, he worked as a singing waiter as a youngster.
In order to fight in France and Germany toward the end of World War Two, he was drafted into the US army in 1944. Of the traumatic event, he stated, “It’s legalized murder.” during a 2013 interview with the Guardian.
His singing career continued after he got home, first going by the name Joe Bari. In 1951, the song Because of You gave him his first number one, and that was the song that gave him his breakthrough.
When Bennett issued his debut record in 1952, he quickly rose to fame among teenagers. The following year, female fans in grief surrounded his wedding.
He continued to have US chart-topping successes in every decade that followed, earning a reputation for his big band and show tune compositions as well as classic swinging pop songs like Blue Velvet and Rags to Riches.
I Left My Heart in San Francisco, which he covered in 1962, catapulted his star to even greater heights. two Grammys for his work in orbit.
Bennett, who participated in the 1965 Selma to Montgomery marches and opposed performing in South Africa during the apartheid era, was a supporter of the civil rights struggle as well.
But as the decade went on, his relevance diminished with the emergence of the Beatles and the Rolling Stones in the US.
Then came personal issues, such as the dissolution of two marriages and drug addiction.
He recorded two records with pianist Bill Evans while continuing to perform despite his pain.
His circumstances started to turn after appointing his son Danny as his manager and reunited with his pianist and musical director Ralph Sharon.
In the 1980s and 1990s, when the artist, who was then in his sixties, was showered with Grammy awards, he experienced a comeback.
The celebrity who had returned to New York from Las Vegas in 1986 got things going again with the release of his comeback album, The Art of Excellence.
Before 1994’s MTV Unplugged, which saw Bennett win the Grammy for album of the year, he released the chart-topping Perfectly Frank, a tribute to his musical hero Sinatra.
Bennett stated in an interview with the Independent in 2008 that he was not astonished by his resurgent success.
“Good music is good music,” he declared. “I don’t care if someone is young or old if they listen to me. In many ways, I have no interest at all in the young.Age piques my interest. When people reach a certain age, they learn how to live correctly, you know?
The late Duke Ellington once confided in me that the word “category” truly irritated him.
“There are no categories in music; it is either good or it isn’t. I perform wonderful songs written by the best songwriters. They are made to last by that caliber of quality. You can count on people singing these songs forever.Bennett never lost his ability to be cool, attracting fresh legions of admirers.
On the follow-up to 2006’s Duets: An American Classic, which featured him singing with Paul McCartney, Stevie Wonder, and George Michael previously, he cooperated with a variety of younger artists that idolized him, including Amy Winehouse, Queen Latifah, and Carrie Underwood.
In 2014, his collaborative album Cheek to Cheek with Lady Gaga made him the at the age of 88, Elvis broke his own prior record as the oldest living act to top the US charts. Gaga called the final product of her collaboration with the “legend” “the most important album of my career.”
He told the New York Times just a few months after turning 90: “I could have retired 16 years ago, but I just love what I’m doing.”
Bennett played his final gigs with Gaga, with whom, for younger fans, he became strongly identified, in 2021, five years after his 2016 Alzheimer’s diagnosis.
At the time, he said on social media: “Life is a gift – even with Alzheimer’s.”
A talented painter outside of music, Bennett had exhibitions of his art in galleries. The Frank Sinatra School of the Arts was also established by him in his Queens of origin Danny, Dae, Joanna, Antonia, and Susan Crow, his wife, are his only surviving spouses.
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