{"id":465,"date":"2010-03-25T11:57:41","date_gmt":"2010-03-25T15:57:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mattthecat.com\/Blog2\/?p=465"},"modified":"2010-03-25T12:01:07","modified_gmt":"2010-03-25T16:01:07","slug":"johnny-maestro-passes-away-at-age-70","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mattthecat.com\/Blog2\/2010\/03\/25\/johnny-maestro-passes-away-at-age-70\/","title":{"rendered":"Johnny Maestro Passes Away At Age 70!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Johnny Maestro<\/span><\/h1>\n

1939 – 2010<\/span><\/h3>\n

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

One of the greatest voices in music passed away on the evening of March 24, 2010 in Florida.\u00c2\u00a0 He had been battling cancer for quite some time.\u00c2\u00a0 The music of Johnny Maestro reached everyone who has ever turned on a radio.\u00c2\u00a0 From his oldies staples with The Crests: (“Sixteen Candles,” “The Angels Listened In,” “Trouble In Paradise,” “Isn’t It Amazing” and “My Juanita” to his late 60s rock masterpiece “The Worst That Could Happen,” we’ve all been touched by his powerful yet angelic voice.\u00c2\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

I was fortunate enough to have interviewed Johnny Maestro back in 2006 and he was a first class interview.\u00c2\u00a0 He cleared a few things up during our time together.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s been printed in many rock n’ roll history books that he was born in Brooklyn, but in fact, Johnny was born on the Lower East Side of Manhattan.\u00c2\u00a0 You can hear my entire interview with Johnny Maestro by clicking on my “radio interviews” page <\/a>or listen to the podcasts at the\u00c2\u00a0bottom of this page.<\/span><\/p>\n

My first Live encounter with Johnny Maestro happened during the hot summer of 1995.\u00c2\u00a0 It was a Saturday Night, mid-summer and I was sitting in my hot, non-air conditioned apartment in Boston’s North End.\u00c2\u00a0 An Italian Feast was going on outside, but I can’t remember which saint was being honored.\u00c2\u00a0 I was playing records and trying to keep cool, when in-between albums, I heard an angelic sound echoing off the city buildings.\u00c2\u00a0 It sounded like the voice was singing “The Angels Listened In.”\u00c2\u00a0 Could it be…THE Johnny Maestro? \u00c2\u00a0I ran down three flights of stairs and out front to find that the REAL Johnny Maestro was standing atop a bandstand at the fire station across Hanover St. from my apartment.\u00c2\u00a0 My jaw dropped and for the next thirty-five minutes I listened to the incredible sound of Johnny Maestro.\u00c2\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

I told Johnny that story when I interviewed him in 2006 and we had a good laugh over it.\u00c2\u00a0 He didn’t remember the actual event, only to say that he played many Italian Feasts in both New York and Boston.\u00c2\u00a0 All I can say is that it was a magical night for me and one that I will never forget.\u00c2\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

\u00c2\u00a0<\/span>Fellow New York doo wopper and music ican, Dion DiMucci posted this statement on his Facebook page.<\/span><\/p>\n

My Dear Friend ” JOHNNY MAESTRO” passed away today….. Last week we had wonderful & lovely conversations about our Lord. Johnny was a class act. He was truly a gentleman. :::…We will miss him. He sang “You’ll Never Walk Alone” like an angel….
\nWE THANK YOU FOR THE BEAUTIFUL TRIP YOU TOOK US ON…LOVE & PEACE<\/em><\/span><\/div>\n
\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/div>\n
Rest in peace, Johnny Maestro.\u00c2\u00a0 Now the angels can hear you front and center.\u00c2\u00a0 They don’t need to evesdrop anymore.<\/span>\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/div>\n

-Matt The Cat<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the greatest singers of all-time, Johnny Maestro of the Crests and The Brooklyn Bridge died on Wednesday, March 24, 2010 at the age of 70.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-465","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-r-i-p"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mattthecat.com\/Blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mattthecat.com\/Blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mattthecat.com\/Blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mattthecat.com\/Blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mattthecat.com\/Blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=465"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.mattthecat.com\/Blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mattthecat.com\/Blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=465"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mattthecat.com\/Blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=465"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mattthecat.com\/Blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=465"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}