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45s.com -- Recording Artist Information: Dusty Springfield
Date Born April 16, 1939 Location London, England Deceased March 2, 1999 - breast cancer Music Pop vocalist, guitarist Charted Pop/Rock Hits 19 Period Active January 25, 1964 to 1970 Biggest Hits You Don't Have To Say You Love Me; Wishin' And Hopin'; Son-Of-A-Preacher Man; What Have I Done To Deserve This? Music List and Data Search Music List Notable Information Dusty Springfield was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1999. Other Names Born Mary O'Brien Other Web Sites Dusty Springfield was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1999. The following information was obtained from the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame:
One of the finest pop-soul vocalists ever to come out of Britain, Dusty Springfield has enjoyed a triumphant, long-lived career as a sultry-voiced diva. She's been deemed "one of the five mighty pop divas of the Sixties" - the others being Aretha Franklin, Dionne Warwick, Diana Ross (of the Supremes) and Martha Reeves (of Martha and the Vandellas) - and no less an authority than Berry Gordy credited her for helping the Motown sound take root in the U.K. Moreover, she asserted herself as an artist and personality at a time when women were generally not given that wide a berth in the music industry. In 1964, she became Britain's most popular female vocalist, and her popularity has proved durable, as she's enjoyed hits in each of the last four decades.
Born Mary O'Brian, she adopted the professional name Dusty Springfield after joining her brother's band, the Springfields. A folk-oriented trio, they became Britain's top-selling group in 1961 and enjoyed an American hit in 1962 with "Silver Threads and Golden Needles." Drawn to rhythm & blues, Dusty left the Springfields in 1963 to launch a solo career. What she achieved was nothing less than a reinvention of British soul music. Springfield's approach had little to do with the guitar-driven rock and roll of the Beatles and other British Invasion bands. She gravitated toward Motown's orchestrated pop-soul, overlaying a coolness and poise that came from her British background. Springfield immediately connected as a solo artist with "I Only Want to Be with You" (#4 U.K., #12 U.S.), which made her the second British pop act after the Beatles to score a stateside hit. Springfield became known as a British interpreter of American songwriters like Randy Newman, Jerry Ragavoy, Gerry Goffin and Carole King. She had her greatest successes with material by pop stylists Burt Bacharach and Hal David, including "Wishin' and Hopin'" (#6) and "The Look of Love" (#22). Back home, Springfield introduced the British public to Motown's caravan of stars as host of a 1965 TV special Her biggest U.S. hit came in 1966 with the heavily orchestrated "You Don't Have to Say You Love Me," an Italian song rewritten with English lyrics.
Springfield switched American labels from Phillips to Atlantic in 1968. The move yielded the masterful Dusty in Memphis. Produced by the crack Atlantic Records team of Jerry Wexler, Arif Mardin and Tom Dowd, Dusty in Memphis is an R&B-steeped album that paired the British vocalist with some of the finest session musicians in the American South. The results included such classic recordings as "Son of a Preacher Man," which returned Springfield to the Top Ten. In another adventurous move, Atlantic matched Springfield with the rising Philly-soul production-songwriting team of Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff on 1970's A Brand New Me.
Thereafter, the Seventies were generally quiet years for Springfield, who moved from London to Los Angeles and recorded only sporadically. She enjoyed some minor hits, but her real comeback came in 1987, when Britain's Pet Shop Boys enlisted her to duet on "What Have I Done to Deserve This," a dance-floor favorite that reached Number Two in the U.S. They also produced her 1990 album, Reputation. Springfield's most recent album of new recordings, A Very Fine Love (1995), returned her to the country and folk genres she'd begun with more than 30 years earlier with the Springfields. A career-spanning three-CD retrospective, The Dusty Springfield Anthology, was released on Mercury/Polygram in 1997. Springfield died on March 2, 1999 from breast cancer.
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