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Donald's Encyclopedia of Popular MusicA B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y ZCAPTAIN and TENNILLEPop duo: Daryl Dragon (b 27 August 1942, Los Angeles; d 2 January 2019, Prescott AZ), keyboards; Toni Tenille (b 8 May 1943, Montgomery AL), vocals. Tennille (classically trained on piano) had co-written an ecology musical Mother Earth with Ron Thronson; Dragon (son of conductor Carmen Dragon) was hired to play in it; he had been a Beach Boys sideman, asked her to join tour with them when the show closed. They carried on as duo and self-financed 'The Way I Want To Touch You', a typical keyboard-based multi-voiced faceless MOR product for a local hit; signed by A&M, married '75; the first LP's title track, Neil Sedaka's 'Love Will Keep Us Together', was no. 1 '75, re-released 'Touch You' no. 4. 'Together' won a Grammy and became the only song to make the Hot 100 in two languages when they re-recorded the album in Spanish (Por Amor Viviremos). Like labelmates the Carpenters, whose sound theirs resembled, they mixed originals with handpicked covers (America's 'Muskrat Love', Smokey Robinson's 'Shop Around', both no. 4 '76). They left A&M as that label embraced new wave at expense of MOR; their first single for Casablanca was no. 1 'Do That To Me One More Time' for a total of seven top ten entries USA, but the attempt to change the image of that disco-oriented label was thwarted by the death of its founder Neil Bogart. They hosted an ABC variety series for one season; Tennille hosted TV talk show, and made a solo album of standards More Than You Know '84 on the Mirage label with a big band, like Linda Ronstadt's What's New showing that standards weren't easy for a younger generation. A&M's publicity department announced that they had married on Valentine's Day '75; they did it for real a few days later, stayed married for nearly 40 years and remained friendly, but Tennille published a memoir in 2016 in which she revealed that the union had not exactly been a love match. |