Gary Miller (3 May 1924 – 15 June 1968) was an English popular music singer and actor of the 1950s and 1960s. His career spanned only 15 years before he died of a heart attack in 1968. He released 24 singles and six EPs on the Pye label between 1955 and 1967. Pye released a further compilation EP after his death.
Gary Miller was born Neville Williams in Blackpool, Lancashire. As a young man, he was a talented soccer player and played for Blackpool Football Club as an amateur. During World War II, he served as a lieutenant in the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve and, on release, enrolled as a student at London University with the intention of becoming a teacher of languages. After performing in college concerts, and with the experience of singing at a Welsh Eisteddfod festival as a schoolboy, Miller embarked on the learning process of small-time cabaret and concert tours, and made his first radio broadcast on Beginners, Please.
As well as singing, he also included dancing in his act, and was involved in negotiations for a small part in the Ray Bolger movie Wheres Charley?, when it was being made in England, but nothing materialized. His first real break came when he was discovered by record executive and songwriter Norman Newell during a Variety appearance at Northampton, which led to him making a few tracks for Columbia Records. He also made regular appearances, singing and dancing, on television in Shop Window, and appeared on the fortnightly Kaleidoscope series.
By 1954, Miller was headlining in variety on the Moss Empires circuit. After a spell with Newell at the newly formed Philips Records in 1953, during which he released mostly romantic ballads, Miller switched to another new label, Pye Nixa, and started recording more up-tempo material. His first hit, The Yellow Rose Of Texas, in 1955, was overtaken by the US Mitch Miller version, but Robin Hood made the Top 10 despite opposition from Dick James, who benefited by having his version played over the titles during the weekly television show.
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| Gary with Charlie Drake |
During that era it was commonplace for several versions of the same song to jostle each other in the singles chart. This was the case with Millers Garden Of Eden, which lost out to Frankie Vaughan. There was also strong competition on Wonderful! Wonderful! from Ronnie Hilton, and on The Story Of My Life from Michael Holliday. Millers record of the latter song is said to have suffered in popularity because he was touring North Africa at the time of its release.
Gary was a difficult singer to categorise, because he sang such a wide variety of different material. His chart successes indicate that he was most suited to light 'pop', but he also sang a great many romantic ballads. He was the consummate professional, but despite his polished performances he never quite managed to break through into the top flight of British balladeers.
Gary probably relied too heavily on recording covers of the songs of others and few of his best releases were without strong competition from well known singers. However, he managed to put something of his own into every one of them. Perhaps in an effort to avoid the competition, Miller reached back to 1945 for his final chart entry, Ive Heard That Song Before (1961); it proved to be one of his best vocal performances. His first album, Meet Mister Miller, contained standards such as Manhattan, April Showers and Stella By Starlight. This was followed by Gary On The Ball, with the Kenny Ball Jazz Band.
By the close of the 1950s, however, his chart career was almost finished, making way for more original rock & roll stars, and he only achieved one further hit in the 1960s, "There Goes That Song Again" at the end of 1961
He had a number of acting roles in the television series The Saint and Gideon's Way, and was a regular panellist on Juke Box Jury. He provided the singing voice for Troy Tempest in the Gerry Anderson series Stingray and recorded 'Aqua Marina', the end titles theme for the series. He also recorded vocals for two different versions of an ultimately-unused end titles theme for Thunderbirds. The song was later re-worked as 'Flying High' for the episode Ricochet; one of the original two versions appears on the Thunderbirds 2 compilation album.
Miller appeared on stage as Steven Kodaly in the 1964 production of She Loves Me, at the Lyric Theatre and on the cast album of that production. Miller returned to the London stage in 1966 to play the role of the crooning Agent VO3 in Bryan Blackburns comedy musical, Come Spy With Me, starring female impersonator Danny La Rue, at Londons home of farce, the Whitehall Theatre.
He died from a heart attack at his south London home on June 15, 1968 (age 44) shortly before production finished on an episode of The Saint, 'The People Importers', in which he was also playing a key part. The series' associate producer, Johnny Goodman, later remarked that Miller was "working night and day" as a consequence of his twin commitments, and that production on the Saint episode had to be completed with a double in place of the actor.
(Edited from Wikipedia, 45-rpm.org., & Shazam)