Sunday, June 22, 2008

Dante's Epic Career

Since the last post, I got a couple of e-mails letting me know that, while Ron Dante's music career has been pretty low-profile since the days of the Archies and the Cuff Links, he is not only still performing and recording (you can order his past two discs from him at rondante.com), but he has also been quite active as a producer, working with Cher, Pat Benatar, and Barry Manilow. The decades-themed Manilow 50s, 60s, and 70s discs are produced by Dante (correction: I've subsequently learned that while Dante produced the early Manilow albums, he only contributed vocals to the 60s and 70s albums), and he even contributes backing vocals on some of the 60s and 70s tracks. It's nothing compared to the pop wonderment that is "Tracy," but it's nice to know that talent continues to express itself over the decades.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm sorry, Cliff, but Mr. Dante did NOT produce any of Mr. Manilow's "decades" cds. He only provided backing vocals on several tracks.
He did, however, co-produce all of Manilow's albums starting with Barry Manilow in 1973 for Bell Records (re-released on the Arista label in 1974 under the title Barry Manilow I), until 1981 when Manilow solo=produced "If I Should Love Again".
I am a fan of both Mr. Manilow and Mr. Dante and was very pleased to see them working together again after so many years.

cliff said...

Thanks for the correction; I have noted it in the revised posting. The error is most likely mine; the person who emailed me wrote "Dante has produced CDs for Barry Manilow and is also contributing vocals to the 60s and 70s cover discs," and I presumed he was indicating that Dante had done both production and vocals on those discs. I stand corrected!