Vic Damone, the American singer whose hits included On the Street Where You Live, Again and You’re Breaking My Heart, has died in the US at the age of 89.
Speaking to the Associated Press, the singer’s daughter Victoria Damone said her father had passed away on Sunday at a hospital in Miami Beach, Florida due to complications from a respiratory illness. Damone’s wife, Rena Rowan, died in November 2016.
Born Vito Rocca Farinola in New York in 1928, Damone found fame as the winner of the variety programme Arthur Godfrey’s Talent Search in 1947.
His career lasted over five decades and also included TV shows and films. The balladeer was hailed by Frank Sinatra as having the “best pipes in the business” and he recorded over 2,000 songs.
US entertainment trade website Deadline.com reports that Damone was offered the part of singer Johnny Fontane in The Godfather but turned it down with the role subsequently going to Al Martino.
In recent years, Damone’s cover of the Lerner and Lowe song On the Street Where You Live from the musical My Fair Lady found a new audience when it was featured in season one of Mad Men.
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