- published: 28 Mar 2008
- views: 4024099
Michael Anthony Orlando Cassavitis (born April 3, 1944), better known as Tony Orlando, is an American show business professional, best known as the lead singer of the group Tony Orlando and Dawn in the early 1970s.
Discovered by producer Don Kirshner, Orlando had songs on the charts in 1961 when he was 16, "Halfway to Paradise" and "Bless You". Orlando then became a producer himself, and at an early age was promoted to a vice-president position at CBS Records, where he was in charge of the April-Blackwood Music division. He sang under the name "Dawn" in the 1970s, and when the songs became hits, he went on tour and the group became "Tony Orlando and Dawn". They had several songs which were major hits including "Candida", "Knock Three Times", and "Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree". The group hosted a variety program, "The Tony Orlando and Dawn Show" on CBS from 1974–76, and then broke up in 1978.
Orlando then continued as a solo singer, performing in Las Vegas and Branson, Missouri. Orlando has hosted the New York City portions of the MDA Labor Day Telethon on WWOR-TV since the 1980s but quit in 2011 in response to Jerry Lewis' firing from the Muscular Dystrophy Association.
Hey girl, what ya doin' down there?
Dancin' alone every night
While I live right above you
I can hear your music playin'
I can feel your body swayin'
One floor below me
You don't even know me, I love you
Oh, my darling, knock three times
On the ceiling if you want me
Twice on the pipe
If the answer is no
Oh, my sweetness
Means you'll meet me in the hallway
Oh, twice on the pipe
Means you ain't gonna show
If you look out your window tonight
Pull in the string with the note
That's attached to my heart
Read how many times I saw you
How in my silence I adored you
And only in my dreams did
That wall between us come apart
Oh, my darling, knock three times
On the ceiling if you want me
Mmm, twice on the pipe
If the answer is no
Oh, my sweetness
Means you'll meet me in the hallway
Whoa, twice on the pipe
Means you ain't gonna show
Oh, I can hear the music playin'
I can feel your body swayin'
One floor below me
You don't even know me, I love you
Oh, my darling, knock three times
On the ceiling if you want me
Oh, twice on the pipe
If the answer is no
(I love you, I love you, I love you)
Oh, my sweetness
Means you'll meet me in the hallway
Mmm, twice on the pipe