Connie FrancisThe top-top pop singer on 50s and 60s classics such as “Dum Cupid” New York Times. She was 87.
Francis’s long -standing friend and president of Concetta Records Ron Roberts announced the news in a Facebook post On Wednesday evening, which Franci’s official account stored. “It is with a heavy heart and extreme sadness that I inform you that my dear friend Connie Francis is going last night,” he wrote. “I know Connie would approve that her fans are among the first to learn this sad news. More information will follow later.”
She had recently been hospitalized for “extreme pain”, but had posted on Facebook July 4 that she “feels much better after a good night.”
Francis became one of the defining female singers in the 50s and 60s, topped the lists on several occasions and sold over 200 million records all over the world with hits such as “stupid cupid”, “who is sad now” and “frankie.” In 1960 she became the first woman to reach No. 1 on Billboard Hot 100 with “Everybody’s Somebody’s Fool” and later became the first woman to receive three songs to hit No. 1.
She recently experienced a revival when the B-page “Pretty Little Baby” went viral on Tiktok, resulting in over 30 million new streams of the song and its entry into Spotify’s global and American charts and reaches the five best of iTunes’ US Pop Songs chart. Francis then joined Tiktok, where she thanked her newfound fans in a video and said she was “incredible and excited” of the song’s popularity over 60 years later.
Born Connie Franconero in Newark, NJ on December 12, 1937, Francis regularly performed at talent competitions and pageants in the neighborhood and eventually prevailed, before a look on variation shows “Arthur Godfrey’s Talent Scouts”, to change her last name to Francis for simpler pronunciation. She had a rocky start in the music industry, with her first eight singles who failed commercially after signing to MGM records in 1955. Although she had her first taste of success in 1957 with Marvin Rainwater duet “The Majesty of Love”, which broke into Billboard Hot 100, ended her recording Constitution with
Francis considered pursuing a career in medicine and was accepted to New York University, but at what was meant to be her last session, she recorded a cover for the 1923 song “Why’s sorry now.” Although the song had a slow start, Dick Clark played it on his “American bandstand” in January 1958 and invited her to perform it on “The Saturday Night Beechnut Show” (which would later be “The Dick Clar Show”). The show launched her career, and “Who’s Sorry Now” reached No. 1 on Britain’s single chart and No. 4 in the United States, resulting in MGM posts renewing her contract.
After collaborating with the songwriting duo Neil Sedaka and Howard Greenfield, Francis had a variety of mapping hits consisting of both original and cover songs such as “Stupid Cupid,” “My Happiness”, “Among my souvenirs”, “Lipstick on your Collar” and “Frankie. She followed it with an album with Italian songs, “Connie Francis sings Italian favorites”, which was released at the end of 1959 and broadened her reach to a more adult audience. But her success with Pop continued into the early 1960s and earned more hits that reached the top 10: “Breakin” in a whole new heart “,” when the boy in your arms (is the boy in your heart), “” Second hand love “and” Where the Boys are. ”
Francis became one of the first recording artists who regularly made albums that were completely sung in other languages, including in Italian, Yiddish, German, Romanian, Spanish and Irish. Her German -speaking song from 1960 “Die Liebe ist Ein Seltsames Spiel” reached No. 1 in West Germany and led to her becoming an extremely popular artist in Europe, which represented the symbol of a female American pop singer to the global masses. Even during the Cold War, her songs were played and well received in the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia.
In the mid-1960s, Francis began to grip on the American charts weakening when the Beatles and Rolling Stones took over. But she remained a successful live artist and sold consistent concerts in the United States and around the world. In 1969, her contract with MGM went out.
The 70s led a difficult period for Francis because she claimed that she had been raped on a motel while she appeared at Westbury Music Fair in New York. Although the striker was never found, she sued the motel chain for insufficient security and won $ 2.5 million in the settlement. But that event fell Francis to depression and she just recorded an album, “Who’s Happy Now?”, In 1978. She later underwent nasal surgery and lost her vote, which meant she could not perform until 1981. The same year her brother by Mafia and Francis again withdrew from Spotlight. In 1984 she wrote about her fighters in the memoer “Who is sad now?”, Which became a best seller.
During his later career, Francis continued to record music and perform live and led several shows in Las Vegas. She released another autobiography, “Among My Souvenirs” in 2017 and officially retired in 2018.
Francis married four times and was also in a relationship with singer Bobby Darin. During her third marriage to the restaurateur Joseph Garzilli, she adopted a son named Joey. She was in a relationship with Tony Ferretti from 2003 until his death in 2022.
She is survived by her son, Joey Garzilli.