Alan Dale (singer)

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Alan Dale (born Aldo Sigismondi; July 9, 1925 – April 20, 2002) was an American singer of traditional popular and rock and roll music.^[1]

Early life

Aldo Sigismondi was born in

Dale's intention was originally not to be a singer, but to go into journalism. However, he quit school after an argument with a teacher and ended up going from one job to another, until one day in 1943 he and a friend passed by a casino in Coney Island and the friend suggested he try out for a singing job. He was told to come back in the evening, and when he came back prepared to sing two songs, was called back for seven encores. He was immediately hired. In 1944, he joined the Carmen Cavallaro Orchestra as featured vocalist, and at Cavallaro's insistence got a new name. The name was taken from Alan-a-Dale. In 1944 and 1945, Dale sang for George Paxton's Orchestra and became increasingly popular on the East Coast performing at the Roseland Ballroom in New York and recording for Majestic Records.

Musical career

In 1947 he was encouraged by Bob Thiele, a record producer, to sign up as a solo artist with Signature Records. He premiered as a soloist on Columbia records in a December 1947 film short featuring the Elliot Lawrence Orchestra.^{[citation needed]} The next year he got his own television show, The Alan Dale Show, on the DuMont Television Network. In 1950, it went to CBS.^[1]

In the early 1950s, he shuttled around from one

He became a friend of Alan Freed, and as a result got a chance to play a role as a rock and roll singer in the 1956 film, Don't Knock the Rock. In this movie, he played alongside Freed, Bill Haley & His Comets, Little Richard, and The Treniers. He sang the title song, which he also recorded as a single. He also sang "I Cry More," the first song written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David to be featured in a motion picture.^[3]

In 1957 he resumed his shuttling from one record label to another, going to ABC, MGM, and United Artists. In 1958, while in a nightclub in New York, Dale was attacked, suffering cuts and a serious hand injury when he crashed into a plate glass window after having fallen down a set of stairs. Dale recovered from his injuries, but the assailant who knocked him down the stairs was never identified.

Career decline and death

At the end of the 1950s, Dale found television hosts such as

Despite this, Dale was able to maintain a lower-profile version of his singing career over the ensuing decades, performing at nightclubs, dinner theaters and concert appearances.

He died in New York in 2002, at the age of 76.