Dusty Springfield

Dusty Springfield was born Mary Isabel Catherine Bernadette O’Brien in West Hampstead on 16th April 1939. She inherited the name Dusty having been regarded as a Tomboy when she was young.

When aged eleven, encouraged by her parents she made her first recording at a record shop in Ealing, Irving Berlin’s When the Midnight Choo Choo Leaves for Alabam. She left school in 1958 and joined her first group, the Lana Sisters. Due to the group already being established she got to make television appearances as well as performing both in the UK and US.

In 1960 she left the group to create her own, alongside her brother Dion O’Brien and Reshad Feild she formed The Springfields. They achieved reasonable success before disbanding in 1963 leaving Dusty with a growing reputation and an influence that had grown beyond country songs to pop.

Moving into a career as a solo artist, Dusty’s first single was I Only Want to be With You which was a top twenty hit either side of the Atlantic (making #4 in the UK) selling over a million copies. Her debut album, A Girl Called Dusty followed reaching #6, that same year she released Wishin’ and Hopin’ and one of her best loved songs I Just Don’t Know What to Do With Myself.

Springfield was a big promoter of Motown music and worked tirelessly at gaining the artists a bigger UK audience, hosting a Ready Steady Go! special what featured the likes of The Temptations and Martha Reeves and the Vandellas. 1967 saw Springfield release another hit and with it get an Academy Award nomination for the track The Look of Love which featured in the Bond spoof Casino Royale.

Her career seemed to be on a downward trajectory when in 1969 she signed with Atlantic Records and with a new team of producers released Dusty in Memphis. The album that featured the likes of Son of a Preacher Man is widely considered to be her best. Unfortunately her Atlantic releases that followed did not find the same success.

Having been out of the limelight Springfield made an unlikely comeback when recruited to sing with the Pet Shop Boys in 1987 on the track What Have I Done to Deserve This? In 1994 while recording the album A Very Fine Love she was diagnosed with breast cancer, and although she continued to work she succumbed to the illness on the 2nd March 1999.