One of the classic teen idols of the late 1950s and early 60s, Bobby Rydell, who has died from complications of pneumonia aged 79, was only seven when he began performing on stage in his home town of Philadelphia. Over the following 70 years, he would sing everything from rock’n’roll and smoochy love songs to disco, Broadway classics and Italian pop tunes.
He notched up 19 singles in the Billboard Top 40, among the most successful of them We Got Love, Wild One and Volare. It was fitting that his name was chosen for Rydell high school in Grease, the Broadway and later film musical that depicted teenage lives in the early rock’n’roll days of the late 50s. If, as a New York Times critic put it, he was “more like a crooner than a rocker”, Rydell’s photogenic looks and endearing personality ensured he would prove far more durable than many flashier, more confrontational artists. Rydell and many of his generation were knocked off their pop pedestals by the dramatic arrival of the Beatles and their British counterparts, but he had the staying power of mainstream performers from a slightly earlier generation.
