DIONNE WARWICK (US)

Born: 12 December 1940
Birth name: Marie Dionne Warrick

Dionne was born in the city of Orange, New Jersey. Her mother was the manager of a gospel group called The Drinkard Singers who were one of the post popular gospel bands in the 50’s. Her sister Dee Dee would also be a singer and would see a number of hits make the US charts. Dionne would perform with the Drinkard Singers and then moved on to The Gospelaires. In both groups she would sing alongside her aunt, Cissy Houston. Cissy was Whitney Houston’s mother, making Dionne Whitney’s cousin. However, it was while recording backing vocals in 1962 for a song by The Drifters, that Dionne was noticed by Burt Bacharach. Bacharach got Dionne to record some demos of songs he was writing. One particular demo caught the attention of the head of Scepter Records who allegedly said ‘Forget the song, get the girl’. Dionne signed to Scepter seconds and released her debut album, ‘Presenting Dionne Warwick’ in 1963. The album contained the song ‘Don’t Make Me Over’ which gave Dionne her first charting hit in the US where it went to number 21. She would go on to see a good number of hits in the US over the rest of the decade. These included a number 6 hit with ‘Walk On By’ in 1964 and a number 4 hit in 1967 with a version of ‘I Say A Little Prayer’. 1968 saw one of her biggest international hits with ‘Do You Know The Way To San Jose’ which went to 10 in the US and 8 in the UK. In 1971 she signed to Warner Brothers Records for $5 million which was regarded as the record for a female artist at the time. However, this meant she was no longer working with Bacharach and his writing partner Hal David and her hits dried up. She did, however, manage her first US number 1 with ‘Then You Came’ which she sang with the group The Spinners. A move to Arista records in 1979 reinvigorated her career and she was back in the top 10 with ‘I’ll Never Love This Way Again’ which went to number 5. In 1982 she teamed up with The Bee Gees who wrote and produced most of the material on her ‘Heartbreaker’ album. The title track would give her her best UK chart position as it peaked at 2. She would hit the top spot again in the US in 1985 when she teamed up with Stevie Wonder, Elton John and Gladys Knight for the hit ‘That’s What Friends Were For’ which was a cover of a Rod Stewart song and was attributed to Dionne & Friends. She has continued to record and release material, with her latest release being 2019’s ‘She’s Back’. She has won 6 Grammy Awards and been nominated for a further 9.

Date of entry	Song	Peak (weeks at 1)	Weeks
19-Jan-1968	(Theme From) Valley Of The Dolls	3	10
02-Nov-1979	I’ll Never Love This Way Again	12	11
17-Dec-1982	Heartbreaker	4	17
03-Sep-1987	Love Power	19	11
		Total hits	4
		Total weeks	49

Biggest climber awards	3
Star rater climbs	6
Biggest fallers	4
Weeks with oldest in the charts	0
Longest run in the charts (weeks)	17
Weeks with more than 1 in the charts	0
Biggest gap between hits (weeks)	605
Top 30 points ranking	171
Top 20 points ranking	203
Top 30 points	800
Top 20 points	356

‘Love Power’ was a duet with Jeffrey Osborne.

Hit as a member of Dionne & Friends:

Date of entry	Song	Peak (weeks at 1)	Weeks
07-Dec-1985	That’s What Friends are For	2	22
		Total hits	1
		Total weeks	22

Total chart involvement:

Number of hits	5
Weeks	71