Roy Hamilton
Encyclopedia
Roy Hamilton was an American
singer, who achieved major success in the US
R&B
and pop
charts in the 1950s. He is best known for his recordings
of "You'll Never Walk Alone
", "Unchained Melody
" and "You Can Have Her".
, Georgia
, Hamilton moved to Jersey City in 1943, studied commercial art
, had opera
tic and classical
voice training, and was a heavyweight Golden Gloves
boxer, before joining the gospel
quartet, The Searchlight Singers. In 1947, he entered and won an amateur talent show at the Apollo Theater
with his 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 a local DJ
Bill Cook, who became his manager. Columbia Records
saw him as a possible "crossover" singer with a foothold in both pop and R&B, and signed him to their subsidiary label
Epic
. 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.
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 So" (#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). His style and sound directly influenced later artists such as Elvis Presley, Jackie Wilson
and the Righteous Brothers.
In mid-1956, Hamilton announced his retirement due to illness and exhaustion, but returned the following year. When he came back, he adopted the harder gospel
sound of his youth, to compete with rock and roll
and the emerging soul
sound. Hamilton appeared in the film
, Let's Rock
, in 1958. 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 (1962). The Epic label treated Hamilton as a major star and issued sixteen albums by him. However, by the mid 1960s, his career declined while recording with MGM
and then RCA
.
His final recordings were made in Memphis
, Tennessee
, at record producer
Chips Moman
's American Group Productions studio
, at the same time that Elvis Presley
recorded there in early 1969. 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.
Hamilton died later in 1969, not long after suffering a stroke
, at age 40, in New Rochelle, New York
. Hamilton's "You'll Never Walk Alone" disc
was brought in from the US by a sailor friend of Gerry Marsden
. As a result, Gerry & the Pacemakers
recorded the track to further success.
Hamilton was inducted into the Georgia Music Hall of Fame in 2010.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
singer, who achieved major success in the US
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
R&B
Rhythm and blues
Rhythm and blues, often abbreviated to R&B, is a genre of popular African American music that originated in the 1940s. The term was originally used by record companies to describe recordings marketed predominantly to urban African Americans, at a time when "urbane, rocking, jazz based music with a...
and pop
Popular music
Popular music belongs to any of a number of musical genres "having wide appeal" and is typically distributed to large audiences through the music industry. It stands in contrast to both art music and traditional music, which are typically disseminated academically or orally to smaller, local...
charts in the 1950s. He is best known for his recordings
Sound recording and reproduction
Sound recording and reproduction is an electrical or mechanical inscription and re-creation of sound waves, such as spoken voice, singing, instrumental music, or sound effects. The two main classes of sound recording technology are analog recording and digital recording...
of "You'll Never Walk Alone
You'll Never Walk Alone (song)
"You'll Never Walk Alone" is a show tune from the 1945 Rodgers and Hammerstein musical Carousel.In the musical, in the second act, Nettie Fowler, the cousin of the female protagonist Julie Jordan, sings "You'll Never Walk Alone" to comfort and encourage Julie when her husband, Billy Bigelow, the...
", "Unchained Melody
Unchained Melody
"Unchained Melody" is a 1955 song with music by Alex North and lyrics by Hy Zaret. It has become one of the most recorded songs of the 20th century, by some counts having spawned over 500 versions in hundreds of different languages....
" and "You Can Have Her".
Biography
Born in LeesburgLeesburg, Georgia
Leesburg is a city in Lee County, Georgia, United States. The population was 2,965 at the 2009 census estimate. The city is the county seat of Lee County.Leesburg is part of the Albany, Georgia Metropolitan Statistical Area.-Geography:...
, Georgia
Georgia (U.S. state)
Georgia is a state located in the southeastern United States. It was established in 1732, the last of the original Thirteen Colonies. The state is named after King George II of Great Britain. Georgia was the fourth state to ratify the United States Constitution, on January 2, 1788...
, Hamilton moved to Jersey City in 1943, studied commercial art
Commercial art
Commercial art is historically a subsector of creative services, referring to art created for commercial purposes, primarily advertising. The term has become increasingly anachronistic in favor of more contemporary terms such as graphic design and advertising art.Commercial art traditionally...
, had opera
Opera
Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...
tic and classical
Classical music
Classical music is the art music produced in, or rooted in, the traditions of Western liturgical and secular music, encompassing a broad period from roughly the 11th century to present times...
voice training, and was a heavyweight Golden Gloves
Golden Gloves
The Golden Gloves is the name given to annual competitions for amateur boxing in the United States. The Golden Gloves is often the term used to refer to the National Golden Gloves competition, but it also can represent several other amateur tournaments, including regional golden gloves...
boxer, before joining the gospel
Gospel music
Gospel music is music that is written to express either personal, spiritual or a communal belief regarding Christian life, as well as to give a Christian alternative to mainstream secular music....
quartet, The Searchlight Singers. In 1947, he entered and won an amateur talent show at the Apollo Theater
Apollo Theater
The Apollo Theater in New York City is one of the most famous, and older, music halls in the United States, and the most famous club associated almost exclusively with Black performers...
with his rendition of "You'll Never Walk Alone
You'll Never Walk Alone (song)
"You'll Never Walk Alone" is a show tune from the 1945 Rodgers and Hammerstein musical Carousel.In the musical, in the second act, Nettie Fowler, the cousin of the female protagonist Julie Jordan, sings "You'll Never Walk Alone" to comfort and encourage Julie when her husband, Billy Bigelow, the...
". However, he did not record commercially until 1953, when he was discovered singing in a New Jersey
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...
club by a local DJ
Disc jockey
A disc jockey, also known as DJ, is a person who selects and plays recorded music for an audience. Originally, "disc" referred to phonograph records, not the later Compact Discs. Today, the term includes all forms of music playback, no matter the medium.There are several types of disc jockeys...
Bill Cook, who became his manager. Columbia Records
Columbia Records
Columbia Records is an American record label, owned by Japan's Sony Music Entertainment, operating under the Columbia Music Group with Aware Records. It was founded in 1888, evolving from an earlier enterprise, the American Graphophone Company — successor to the Volta Graphophone Company...
saw him as a possible "crossover" singer with a foothold in both pop and R&B, and signed him to their subsidiary label
Record label
In the music industry, a record label is a brand and a trademark associated with the marketing of music recordings and music videos. Most commonly, a record label is the company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the production, manufacture, distribution, marketing and promotion,...
Epic
Epic Records
Epic Records is an American record label, owned by Sony Music Entertainment. Though it was originally conceived as a jazz imprint, it has since expanded to represent various genres. L.A...
. 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.
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 So" (#4 R&B), "Ebb Tide" (#5 R&B), "Hurt" (#8 R&B), "Unchained Melody
Unchained Melody
"Unchained Melody" is a 1955 song with music by Alex North and lyrics by Hy Zaret. It has become one of the most recorded songs of the 20th century, by some counts having spawned over 500 versions in hundreds of different languages....
" (#1 R&B, #6 pop), and "Don’t Let Go" (#2 R&B, #13 pop). His style and sound directly influenced later artists such as Elvis Presley, Jackie Wilson
Jackie Wilson
Jack Leroy "Jackie" Wilson, Jr. was an American singer and performer. Known as "Mr. Excitement", Wilson was important in the transition of rhythm and blues into soul. He was known as a master showman, and as one of the most dynamic singers and performers in R&B and rock history...
and the Righteous Brothers.
In mid-1956, Hamilton announced his retirement due to illness and exhaustion, but returned the following year. When he came back, he adopted the harder gospel
Gospel music
Gospel music is music that is written to express either personal, spiritual or a communal belief regarding Christian life, as well as to give a Christian alternative to mainstream secular music....
sound of his youth, to compete with rock and roll
Rock and roll
Rock and roll is a genre of popular music that originated and evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s, primarily from a combination of African American blues, country, jazz, and gospel music...
and the emerging soul
Soul music
Soul music is a music genre originating in the United States combining elements of gospel music and rhythm and blues. According to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, soul is "music that arose out of the black experience in America through the transmutation of gospel and rhythm & blues into a form of...
sound. Hamilton appeared in the film
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
, Let's Rock
Let's Rock
Let's Rock is a 1958 rock and roll film starring Julius LaRosa as a crooner attempting to fight off the rival music rock and roll, Phyllis Newman as his songwriting girlfriend who convinces him to adapt rather than fight and Conrad Janis as LaRosa's manager...
, in 1958. His last hit record
Hit record
A hit record is a sound recording, usually in the form of a single or album, that sells a large number of copies or otherwise becomes broadly popular or well-known, through airplay, club play, inclusion in a film or stage play soundtrack, causing it to have "hit" one of the popular chart listings...
, "You Can Have Her" (#6 R&B, #12 pop), came in 1961, and was followed by the album Mr. Rock And Soul (1962). The Epic label treated Hamilton as a major star and issued sixteen albums by him. However, by the mid 1960s, his career declined while recording with MGM
MGM Records
MGM Records was a record label started by the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer film studio in 1946, for the purpose of releasing soundtrack albums of their musical films. Later it became a pop label, lasting into the 1970s...
and then RCA
RCA Records
RCA Records is one of the flagship labels of Sony Music Entertainment. The RCA initials stand for Radio Corporation of America , which was the parent corporation from 1929 to 1985 and a partner from 1985 to 1986.RCA's Canadian unit is Sony's oldest label...
.
His final recordings were made in Memphis
Memphis, Tennessee
Memphis is a city in the southwestern corner of the U.S. state of Tennessee, and the county seat of Shelby County. The city is located on the 4th Chickasaw Bluff, south of the confluence of the Wolf and Mississippi rivers....
, Tennessee
Tennessee
Tennessee is a U.S. state located in the Southeastern United States. It has a population of 6,346,105, making it the nation's 17th-largest state by population, and covers , making it the 36th-largest by total land area...
, at record producer
Record producer
A record producer is an individual working within the music industry, whose job is to oversee and manage the recording of an artist's music...
Chips Moman
Chips Moman
Lincoln Wayne "Chips" Moman is an American record producer, guitarist, and songwriter. As a record producer, Moman is known for recording Elvis Presley, Bobby Womack, Carla Thomas, and Merrilee Rush, as well as guiding the career of the Box Tops in Memphis, Tennessee during the 1960s...
's American Group Productions studio
Recording studio
A recording studio is a facility for sound recording and mixing. Ideally both the recording and monitoring spaces are specially designed by an acoustician to achieve optimum acoustic properties...
, at the same time that Elvis Presley
Elvis Presley
Elvis Aaron Presley was one of the most popular American singers of the 20th century. A cultural icon, he is widely known by the single name Elvis. He is often referred to as the "King of Rock and Roll" or simply "the King"....
recorded there in early 1969. Songs released from those sessions were versions of James Carr
James Carr (musician)
James Carr , was an American Rhythm & Blues and soul singer.Born to a Baptist preacher's family in Coahoma, Mississippi, Carr began singing in church and was performing in gospel groups and making tables on an assembly line in Memphis, Tennessee, when he began recording in the mid-'60s for Goldwax...
's "The Dark End of the Street
The Dark End of the Street
"The Dark End of the Street" is a 1967 soul song written by Muscle Shoals songwriters Dan Penn and Chips Moman and first performed by James Carr...
", Conway Twitty
Conway Twitty
Conway Twitty , born Harold Lloyd Jenkins, was an American country music artist. He also had success in early rock and roll, R&B, and pop music. He held the record for the most number one singles of any act with 55 No. 1 Billboard country hits until George Strait broke the record in 2006...
's "It's Only Make Believe
It's Only Make Believe
"It's Only Make Believe" is the title of a song written by Jack Nance and American country music artist Conway Twitty, released by Twitty as a single in July 1958. The single topped both U.S...
", and "Angelica", a Barry Mann
Barry Mann
Barry Mann is an American songwriter, and part of a successful songwriting partnership with his wife, Cynthia Weil.-Career:...
and Cynthia Weil
Cynthia Weil
Cynthia Weil is a prominent American songwriter. She is famous for having written many songs together with her husband Barry Mann....
song that had been submitted to Presley, but which he then turned over to Hamilton.
Hamilton died later in 1969, not long after suffering a stroke
Stroke
A stroke, previously known medically as a cerebrovascular accident , is the rapidly developing loss of brain function due to disturbance in the blood supply to the brain. This can be due to ischemia caused by blockage , or a hemorrhage...
, at age 40, in New Rochelle, New York
New Rochelle, New York
New Rochelle is a city in Westchester County, New York, United States, in the southeastern portion of the state.The town was settled by refugee Huguenots in 1688 who were fleeing persecution in France...
. Hamilton's "You'll Never Walk Alone" disc
Gramophone record
A gramophone record, commonly known as a phonograph record , vinyl record , or colloquially, a record, is an analog sound storage medium consisting of a flat disc with an inscribed, modulated spiral groove...
was brought in from the US by a sailor friend of Gerry Marsden
Gerry Marsden
Gerard "Gerry" Marsden is an English musician and television personality, best known for being leader of the British band Gerry & the Pacemakers.-Biography:...
. As a result, Gerry & the Pacemakers
Gerry & the Pacemakers
Gerry and the Pacemakers were a British beat music group prominent during the 1960s. In common with The Beatles, they came from Liverpool, were managed by Brian Epstein and recorded by George Martin. They are most remembered for being the first act to reach number one in the UK Singles Chart with...
recorded the track to further success.
Hamilton was inducted into the Georgia Music Hall of Fame in 2010.
Singles (chart hits only)
| Year | Title | Label & Cat. No. | U.S. Pop Billboard Hot 100 The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday... |
U.S. R&B Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs, is a chart released weekly by Billboard in the United States.The chart, initiated in 1942, is used to track the success of popular music songs in urban, or primarily African American, venues. Dominated over the years at various times by jazz, rhythm and blues, doo-wop, soul,... |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1954 | "You'll Never Walk Alone You'll Never Walk Alone (song) "You'll Never Walk Alone" is a show tune from the 1945 Rodgers and Hammerstein musical Carousel.In the musical, in the second act, Nettie Fowler, the cousin of the female protagonist Julie Jordan, sings "You'll Never Walk Alone" to comfort and encourage Julie when her husband, Billy Bigelow, the... " |
Epic 9016 | |
|
| 1954 | "If I Loved You" | Epic 9047 | |
|
| 1954 | "Ebb Tide" | Epic 9068 | |
|
| 1954 | "Hurt" | Epic 9086 | |
|
| 1955 | "Unchained Melody Unchained Melody "Unchained Melody" is a 1955 song with music by Alex North and lyrics by Hy Zaret. It has become one of the most recorded songs of the 20th century, by some counts having spawned over 500 versions in hundreds of different languages.... " |
Epic 9102 | |
|
| 1955 | "Forgive This Fool" | Epic 9111 | |
|
| 1955 | "Without A Song" | Epic 9125 | |
|
| 1955 | "Everybody's Got A Home" | Epic 9132 | |
|
| 1957 | "So Long" | Epic 9212 | |
|
| 1957 | "Don't Let Go" | Epic 9257 | |
|
| 1958 | "Pledging My Love Pledging My Love "Pledging My Love" is a blues ballad. It was written by Ferdinand Washington and Don Robey and published in 1954.The song's theme is captured in the title and the opening lines:-Johnny Ace:The most popular recording of the song was done by Johnny Ace... " |
Epic 9294 | |
|
| 1959 | "I Need Your Lovin'" | Epic 9307 | |
|
| 1959 | "Time Marches On" | Epic 9323 | |
|
| 1961 | "You Can Have Her" | Epic 9434 | |
|
| 1961 | "You're Gonna Need Magic" | Epic 9443 | |
|