{"id":185,"date":"2012-09-28T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2012-09-28T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/empowernetwork.com\/simonlee\/andy-williams-moon-river-singer-dies-at-84\/"},"modified":"2012-09-28T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2012-09-28T00:00:00","slug":"andy-williams-moon-river-singer-dies-at-84","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/empowernetwork.com\/simonlee\/andy-williams-moon-river-singer-dies-at-84\/","title":{"rendered":"Andy Williams, \u2018Moon River\u2019 Singer, Dies at 84"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"\/<\/p>\n

Andy Williams<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Andy Williams, whose corn-fed good looks, easygoing charm and smooth rendition of \u201cMoon River\u201d propelled him to the heights of music stardom in the early \u201960s, died Tuesday at his home in Branson, Mo., following a battle with bladder cancer, his family announced.<\/p>\n

He was 84, and 2012 had marked his 75th year in showbiz. Williams is survived by his wife Debbie and his three children, Robert, Noelle and Christian.<\/p>\n

With 17 gold and three platinum records to his name, Williams enjoyed his golden years playing golf and dividing his time between La Quinta, Calif., and Branson, where he appeared at his Andy Williams Moon River Theater since 1992.<\/p>\n

It was on the stage of that theater, in November 2011, Williams announced\u00a0he had bladder cancer<\/a>. At the time, he assured fans the disease was no longer a death sentence and that he had every intention of being a survivor.<\/p>\n

Born in Wall Lake, Iowa, the son of a railroad worker, Howard Andrew WIlliams sang in his family\u2019s church choir with older siblings Bob, Dick and Don. In the late \u201930s, the boys built up a name for themselves regionally on Midwestern radio stations as the Williams Brothers quartet.<\/p>\n

After the war, in 1947, they joined entertainer Kay Thompson in her innovative and sophisticated nightclub act. In his 2009 memoir\u00a0Moon River and Me<\/em>, Williams admitted he had a long affair with Thompson, who had been a legendary vocal coach at MGM (she taught Judy Garland and\u00a0Lena Horne<\/a>\u00a0to sing for the screen) and was 18 years the senior of her handsome young prot\u00e9g\u00e9.<\/p>\n

In 1952, when the brothers\u2019 act broke up, Andy launched his solo career, only to find himself broke and without bookings. Giving himself one last shot, he wisely switched his repertoire from clever No\u00ebl Coward ditties to the latest pop hits, and his New York club appearances soon included singing spots on the\u00a0Tonight<\/em>\u00a0show (which was in Manhattan at the time), then regular TV shots and a Columbia Records contract.<\/p>\n

By the early \u201960s he had an easy-listening hit under his belt, \u201cCan\u2019t Get Used to Losing You,\u201d though it was his romantic take on the Best Song Oscar winner from 1961\u2032s\u00a0Breakfast at Tiffany\u2019s<\/em>, \u201cMoon River,\u201d that landed him on the map \u2013 and kept him there.<\/p>\n

The smash hit recording led to NBC\u2019s 1962 launch of\u00a0The Andy Williams Show<\/em>, which remained on the air until 1971 and then returned as an annual Christmas special. It was on the variety weekly program in 1963 that Williams introduced to America a group of young singing siblings from Utah, The Osmond Brothers.<\/p>\n

Despite his own clean-cut good looks \u2013 the Williams signature look was a turtleneck under a brightly colored pullover sweater \u2013 scandal did touch Williams\u2019s life. In the mid-1970s, his ex-wife, French dancer\u00a0Claudine Longet, went on trial<\/a>\u00a0in Aspen for the fatal shooting of her lover, international skiing star Vladimir (\u201cSpider\u201d) Sabich.<\/p>\n

In the end, Longet, who claimed the shooting was an accident, was found guilty of misdemeanor criminal negligence and received only a 30-day sentence, which she served on and off at her convenience. In his 2009 memoir, Williams, who during the trial had accompanied his ex-wife to the courtroom on a daily basis, continued to defend her innocence.<\/p>\n

Longet and Williams were married from 1961 to 1975 and had three children together: Noelle, Christian, and Robert. They survive him, as does his second wife (since 1991), Debbie Williams.<\/p>\n

\n

\"Andy<\/p>\n

From left: Merrill Osmond, Donny Osmond, Alan Osmond, Andy Williams, Wayne Osmond and Jay Osmond<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Andy Williams \u00a0 Andy Williams, whose corn-fed good looks, easygoing charm and smooth rendition of \u201cMoon River\u201d propelled him to the heights of music stardom in the early \u201960s, died Tuesday at his home in Branson, Mo., following a battle with bladder cancer, his family announced. He was 84, and 2012 had marked his 75th […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1460,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4,80,81,5,82,6,8],"tags":[1176,42,43,44,45,47,1177,48,106,49,113,13,1179,1178,807],"class_list":["post-185","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-100-commissions","category-about","category-animal","category-arts-culture","category-atmosphere","category-autos-cars","category-beauty-and-fashion","category-celebrity","tag-andy-williams","tag-animals","tag-apple","tag-astronomy","tag-babies","tag-biology","tag-bladder-cancer","tag-cars","tag-celebrity","tag-celebrity-news","tag-chemistry","tag-climate-change","tag-computing","tag-moon-river","tag-music"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/empowernetwork.com\/simonlee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/empowernetwork.com\/simonlee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/empowernetwork.com\/simonlee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/empowernetwork.com\/simonlee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1460"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/empowernetwork.com\/simonlee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=185"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/empowernetwork.com\/simonlee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/empowernetwork.com\/simonlee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=185"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/empowernetwork.com\/simonlee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=185"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/empowernetwork.com\/simonlee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=185"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}