A Frank Sinatra copyist in the forties, Damone later extended his range to become one of the few remaining practitioners of the art of romantic ballad singing. After winning a place on Arthur Godfrey Talent Scouts, in 1947, he started singing regularly on the radio and at nightclubs, and signed with Mercury Records. ‘I Have But One Heart’ gave him a minor hit but his first big success was ‘Again’ from the film Road House (1948). Another million-seller was ‘You’re Breaking My Heart’, based on the turn-of-the-century ballad by Leoncavallo. Signed to a film contract (by MGM), like many singers of the time,

Damone had an undistinguished screen career beginning with ‘Rich Young and Pretty’ and ending with ‘Spree’. By the early fifties Damone was a moderately successful recording star. His hits included a revival of ‘Why Was I Born?’, film songs such as ‘Vagabond Shoes’ and ‘Just Say I Love Her’, and even versions of ‘Tzena, Tzena, Tzena’ (originally a hit for Mitch Miller, the man who had signed Damone to Mercury) and ‘Truly, Truly Fair’, the best selling version of which was by Guy Mitchell) produced by Miller on Columbia, for whom he now worked.                
   These last two records saw Damone attempt to sing in a more muscular fashion, but the record that established his star status marked a return to traditional balladry. ‘On the Street Where You Live’ was from Lerner’s and Loewe’s Broadway show ‘My Fair Lady’, which opened to great success in 1956. Subsequent records for Columbia, which included the theme songs to ‘War and Peace’, ‘An Affair to Remember’, one of the last songs written by Harry Warren, and ‘Gigi’, were less successful, as were his sixties recordings for Capitol.         
   A move to Warners garnered him only one hit, ‘You Were Only Fooling’. Despite his lack of hit singles and a brief period of bankruptcy in the early seventies, Damone remained a regular at Las Vegas nightclubs and continued recording, most successfully on RCA throughout the eighties.