Arnold George Dorsey was born in Madras, British India (present-day Chennai India) in 1936, one of ten children to British Army NCO Mervyn Dorsey, who was of Welsh descent, and his wife Olive, who according to Dorsey was of German descent. It is also believed that he is of Anglo-Indian descent. His family moved to Leicester, England, when he was ten. He soon showed an interest in music and began learning the saxophone. By the early 1950s, he was playing saxophone in nightclubs, but he is believed not to have tried singing until he was seventeen, when friends coaxed him into entering a pub contest. His impression of Jerry Lewis prompted friends to begin calling him "Gerry Dorsey", a name that he worked under for almost a decade.
Dorsey's music career was interrupted by his national service in the British Army Royal Corps of Signals during the mid-1950s. He got his first chance to record in 1958 with Decca Records after his discharge. His first single "I'll Never Fall in Love Again" was not a hit, but Dorsey recorded for the same company almost a decade later with very different results. He continued working the nightclubs until 1961, when he was stricken with tuberculosis. He regained his health and returned to nightclub work, but with little success. Dorsey spent the early 1960s living in a house with Johnny "Sambuca" Todd in Jersey where he honed his talent.
In 1965, Dorsey teamed up with Gordon Mills, his former roommate in the Bayswater area of London, who had become a music impresario and the manager of Tom Jones. Mills, aware that Dorsey had been struggling for several years to become successful in the music industry, suggested a name change to the more arresting Engelbert Humperdinck, borrowed from the German 19th Century composers of operas such as Hansel and Gretel. Dorsey adopted the name professionally but not legally. Mills arranged a new deal for him with Decca Records, and Dorsey has been performing under this name ever since.
(above from Wikipedia)
Many thanks to James Dray for inspiring this post due to his amazing entries on obscure unknowns ... Go to Jim's blog to see many of his great posts here.
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