You Know His Voice! He's The Legendary Ron Dante!

<p>Ron Dante was born in Staten Island, NY.</p> <p>He was a member of the Detergents, whose “Leader of the Laundromat” made the Top 40 when he was just 20 years old. He was working with Don Kirshner and singing and songwriting with the Brill Building group of artists such as Carole King, Tony Orlando, and Neil Sedaka before most of them became household names.</p> <p>He’s produced several Broadway musicals, including the Tony Award-winning Ain’t Misbehavin’. He produced Barry Manilow’s hit albums, sang backup on “Mandy,” basically discovered Pat Benatar, and then, of course, there’s work as the voice of the Archies and the Cuff Links.</p> <p>The question shouldn’t be who was he — it should be who wasn’t he. He’s done everything, and he’s still doing it. He’s the one and only Ron Dante.</p> <p>REBEAT: I read that you were from a musical family and your dad sang around the house a lot and that’s where your love of music came from.<br /> RON DANTE: Yes, my dad wasn’t a professional singer but he loved to sing as did his six brothers. When we’d go to a wedding, everybody would get up and sing, everybody was a ham.</p> <p>I heard music very early in my life. My dad loved his records and had a big stack of 78s on the record player. He’d run a string to the couch so he could change the records and listen to six or seven records in a row.</p> <p>I listened to the Platters, Patti Page, and then I discovered Elvis when I was 10, and that changed my life completely. A few years later, I fell from a tree and injured my arm, and the doctor said I needed to exercise it, to do something to work the arm. I decided I’d play the guitar, so Dad bought me one.</p> <p>Then when I was about 14, I put my first band together, the Persuaders. One New Year’s Eve, I made $75 playing, so I said, “Well, this is the profession I want to be in!” I mean, I’m 14 and made $75 for one gig, and my dad worked all week for $50. I said, “This is something I can do.”</p> <p>You made the Detergents record, “Leader of the Laundromat,” in 1965. But before