Roy Hamilton (b. April 16, 1929, Leesburg, Georgia – July 20, 1969, New Rochelle, New York) was an American singer who achieved major success in the R&B and pop charts in the 1950s.
Hamilton moved to Jersey City in 1943, studied commercial art, had operatic and classical voice training, and was a heavyweight Golden Gloves boxer, before joining the gospel quartet, The Searchlight Singers.[citation needed] In 1947, he entered and won an amateur talent show at the Apollo Theater with his dramatic rendition of "You'll Never Walk Alone". However, he did not record commercially until 1953 when he was discovered singing in a New Jersey club by local DJ Bill Cook, who became his manager.[citation needed] Columbia Records saw him as a possible "crossover" singer with a foothold in both pop and R&B, and signed him to their subsidiary Epic label.[citation needed] His first single, "You'll Never Walk Alone", became an R&B number 1 for eight weeks, and a national US Top 30 hit in 1954, and shot Hamilton to fame.[citation needed]
He followed up with a string of singles that reached both R&B and pop audiences, many of which were popular show tunes of the day. These included "If I Loved You" (# 4 R&B), "Ebb Tide" (# 5 R&B), "Hurt" (# 8 R&B), "Unchained Melody" (# 1 R&B, # 6 pop), and "Don’t Let Go" (# 2 R&B, # 13 pop).[citation needed] His style and sound directly influenced later artists such as Jackie Wilson and the Righteous Brothers.[citation needed]
In mid-1956, Hamilton announced his retirement due to illness and exhaustion, but returned the following year.[citation needed] When he came back, he adopted the harder gospel sound of his youth to compete with rock 'n' roll and the emerging soul sound.[vague] Hamilton appeared in the movie, "Let's Rock", in 1956. His last hit record, "You Can Have Her" (# 6 R&B, # 12 pop), came in 1961, and was followed by the album Mr. Rock And Soul in 1962. The Epic label treated Hamilton as a major star and issued 16 albums by him. However, in the mid-1960s, his career declined while recording with MGM and then RCA Records.
His final recordings were made in Memphis at producer Chips Moman's American Group Productions studio at the same time that Elvis Presley recorded there in early 1969.[citation needed] Songs released from those sessions were versions of James Carr's "The Dark End of the Street", Conway Twitty's "It's Only Make Believe", and "Angelica", a Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil song that had been submitted to Presley, but which he then turned over to Hamilton.[citation needed]
Hamilton died later in 1969, not long after suffering a stroke, at age 40.[citation needed]
Roy Hamilton was inducted into the Georgia Music Hall of Fame, September 17th.
References
- Guralnick, Peter (1999): Careless Love: The Unmaking of Elvis Presley, Little, Brown and Company, London. ISBN 0 316 64402 1 (Information on Roy Hamilton's Memphis recordings & meeting Presley)
Roy Hamilton's 'You'll Never Walk Alone' disc was brought in from America by a seaman friend of Gerry Marsden. As a result The Pacemakers did their version to eventually become the Liverpool football anthem.
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