Tony Bennett’s son and manager pays tribute

completemusicupdate.com:

Tony Bennett’s son and long-time manager D’Andrea ‘Danny’ Bennett has spoken to People magazine following his father’s death last week.“Tony, my father, imbued the essence of the American dream”, the younger Bennett said in a People article that was published yesterday. “He taught us all that remarkable opportunities will reveal themselves and that anything is possible when you stick by your passion, believe in yourself and dedicate your life to quality”.“He was an artist, a humanitarian and an inspiration to anyone who experienced his elegance and grace”, Danny went on. “He and I experienced an amazing journey together as father and son, and I’m simply proud and humble to have been a small part of his legacy”.Bennett’s death was announced on Friday by his publicist Sylvia Weiner in a statement to the Associated Press.

No cause of death was confirmed, although the 96 year old had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in 2016.A subsequent statement on the musician’s Twitter page said: “Tony left us today but he was still singing the other day at his piano and his last song was ‘Because Of You’, his first number one hit.

Tony, because of you we have your songs in our heart forever”.Born Anthony Dominick Benedetto in New York in 1926, Bennett first began performing as a singing waiter in his early teens, before enrolling to study music and painting at New York’s School Of Industrial Art.After a stint in the US army towards the end of World War Two, he returned to America and continued pursuing a career as a singer.

Having signed with Columbia Records, his big break came in 1951 with his recording of the aforementioned ‘Because Of You’, which spent ten weeks at number one.Further hits then followed throughout the 1950s and.