Luigi Federico Creatore (December 21, 1921 – December 13, 2015) was an American songwriter and record producer. Creatore was born in New York City in 1921, the son of noted Italian-born bandleader and composer

Giuseppe Creatore Giuseppe Creatore (), called the Great Creatore, was an Italian bandmaster in Italy and the United States. He was born in Naples, Italy on June 21, 1871, and died in New York City on August 15, 1952. Creatore's fame rivaled that of John Philip S ...

. After serving with the

United States military The United States Armed Forces are the military forces of the United States. The armed forces consists of six service branches: the Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Air Force, Space Force, and Coast Guard. The president of the United States is ...

during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

, in the 1950s he became a writer then partnered with his cousin,

Hugo Peretti Hugo E. Peretti (December 6, 1916 – May 1, 1986) was an American songwriter, trumpeter, and record producer. Born in New York City to an Italian American family, Peretti began his music career as a teenager, playing the trumpet in the Bors ...

to form the songwriting team of

Hugo & Luigi Hugo & Luigi were an American record producing team, made up of songwriters and producers Hugo Peretti and Luigi Creatore, who shared an office in New York's Brill Building. Besides their working relationship, they were cousins. Background Fi ...

which also produced other records. In 1957, they bought into

Roulette Records Roulette Records was an American record company and label founded in 1957 by George Goldner, Joe Kolsky, Morris Levy and Phil Kahl, with creative control given to producers and songwriters Hugo Peretti and Luigi Creatore. Levy was appointed d ...

where they both wrote songs for various artists such as

Valerie Carr Valerie Carr (born 1936, New York City, United States) is an American singer, best known for being a one hit wonder. Career Valerie Carr recorded for King Records in the mid-1950s before being signed by Roulette Records in 1958, where she re ...

and produced major hits for Jimmie Rodgers including "

Honeycomb A honeycomb is a mass of hexagonal prismatic wax cells built by honey bees in their nests to contain their larvae and stores of honey and pollen. Beekeepers may remove the entire honeycomb to harvest honey. Honey bees consume about of honey t ...

" (

Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertis ...

#1) and "

Kisses Sweeter Than Wine "Kisses Sweeter Than Wine" is a popular song, with lyrics written and music adapted in 1950 by Pete Seeger and Lee Hays of The Weavers, and recorded by Jimmie Rodgers. The tune was adapted from Lead Belly's "If It Wasn't for Dicky" (1937), w ...

" (Billboard #3), and " Oh-Oh, I'm Falling in Love Again" and " Secretly". Two years later, Creatore and Peretti signed a deal with

RCA Victor RCA Records is an American record label currently owned by Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America. It is one of Sony Music's four flagship labels, alongside RCA's former long-time rival Columbia Records; also Ar ...

where they produced pop

crooner Crooner is a term used to describe primarily male singers who performed using a smooth style made possible by better microphones which picked up quieter sounds and a wider range of frequencies, allowing the singer to access a more dynamic ran ...

and

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American English-language commercial broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, its headquarters ...

television personality

Perry Como Pierino Ronald "Perry" Como (; May 18, 1912 – May 12, 2001) was an Italian-American singer, actor and television personality. During a career spanning more than half a century, he recorded exclusively for RCA Victor for 44 years, after signi ...

. In addition, they produced several other RCA Victor recording artists, including Sam Cooke and Ray Peterson and wrote English lyrics for the song " The Lion Sleeps Tonight" (with the original bulk of the song written by

Solomon Linda Solomon Popoli Linda (19098 September 1962), also known as Solomon Ntsele ("Linda" was his clan name),Gilmore, Inigo"Penniless sisters fight record industry over father's hit song" '' The Telegraph'' (UK), 11 June 2000. was a South African music ...

), producing the hit single for The Tokens. With

George David Weiss George David Weiss (April 9, 1921 – August 23, 2010) was an American songwriter and arranger, who was a president of the Songwriters Guild of America. He is an inductee in the Songwriters Hall of Fame. Biography Weiss was born in a Jewish fa ...

they co-wrote " Can't Help Falling in Love" for

Elvis Presley Elvis Aaron Presley (January 8, 1935 – August 16, 1977), or simply Elvis, was an American singer and actor. Dubbed the "Honorific nicknames in popular music, King of Rock and Roll", he is regarded as Cultural impact of Elvis Presley, one ...

. Peretti and Creatore also wrote the Presley film theme " Wild in the Country". He and Peretti left RCA Victor in 1964 to join Weiss in writing a musical about the

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by state ...

. Titled ''

Maggie Flynn ''Maggie Flynn'' is a 1968 musical with a book by Morton DaCosta and music and lyrics by Hugo Peretti, Luigi Creatore, and George David Weiss. Based on an idea by John Flaxman, it was inspired by a true story set in the New York Draft Riots ...

'' (starring

Shirley Jones Shirley Mae Jones (born March 31, 1934) is an American actress and singer. In her six decades in show business, she has starred as wholesome characters in a number of musical films, such as ''Oklahoma!'' (1955), '' Carousel'' (1956), and ''The M ...

) it briefly ran on Broadway in 1968. In the 1970s, Creatore and Peretti owned part of Avco Records and then established H&L Records, which they operated until retiring at the end of the decade. Among their successes were recordings by

The Stylistics The Stylistics are an American, Philadelphia soul group that achieved their greatest chart success in the 1970s. They formed in 1968, with a lineup of singers Russell Thompkins Jr., Herb Murrell, Airrion Love, James Smith and James Dunn. All ...

and The Softones. They also won the 1977 Grammy Award for Best Musical Show Album as producers for ''Bubbling Brown Sugar''. His play ''An Error of the Moon'', a speculative exploration of the relationship between the actor

Edwin Booth Edwin Thomas Booth (November 13, 1833 – June 7, 1893) was an American actor who toured throughout the United States and the major capitals of Europe, performing Shakespearean plays. In 1869, he founded Booth's Theatre in New York. Some theatri ...

and his brother

John Wilkes Booth John Wilkes Booth (May 10, 1838 – April 26, 1865) was an American stage actor who assassinated United States President Abraham Lincoln at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C., on April 14, 1865. A member of the prominent 19th-century Booth the ...

, directed by

Kim Weild Kim Weild is a Drama Desk Award-nominated American theatre director, educator, writer, actor and choreographer. Background As an actor and dancer, Kim Weild has performed extensively in both Europe and the United States. Among her many collabo ...

, was performed

off-Broadway An off-Broadway theatre is any professional theatre venue in New York City with a seating capacity between 100 and 499, inclusive. These theatres are smaller than Broadway theatres, but larger than off-off-Broadway theatres, which seat fewer th ...

until October 10, 2010. Creatore died from complications of pneumonia on December 13, 2015, eight days before his 94th birthday in

Boca Raton, Florida Boca Raton ( ; es, Boca Ratón, link=no, ) is a city in Palm Beach County, Florida, United States. It was first incorporated on August 2, 1924, as "Bocaratone," and then incorporated as "Boca Raton" in 1925. The population was 97,422 in the ...

References

External links

ASCAP
{{DEFAULTSORT:Creatore, Luigi 1921 births 2015 deaths Deaths from pneumonia in Florida Record producers from New York (state) Songwriters from New York (state) American military personnel of World War II Grammy Award winners American people of Italian descent American musical theatre lyricists Musicians from New York City