Roger Daltrey

Roger Harry Daltrey, CBE (born 1 March 1944) is an English singer, musician, songwriter and actor, best known as the founder and lead singer of English rock band The Who. He has maintained a musical career as a solo artist and has also worked in the film industry, acting in films, theatre and television roles and also producing films. In 2008 he was ranked number 61 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 100 greatest singers of all time. --- Roger Harry Daltrey was born in the Hammersmith area of London, but was brought up in Acton, the same working class suburban district that produced fellow Who members Pete Townshend and John Entwistle. He was one of three children born to parents Irene and Harry Daltrey, and grew up with two sisters, Gillian and Carol Daltrey. Daltrey attended Victoria Primary School and then Acton County Grammar School for Boys and girls along with Townshend and Entwistle. He showed academic promise in the English state school system, ranking at the top of his class on the eleven plus examination that led to his enrollment at the Acton County Grammar School. His parents hoped he would eventually continue on to study at university, but Daltrey turned out to be a self-described "school rebel" and developed a dedicated interest in the emerging rock and roll music scene instead. He made his first guitar from a block of wood, a cherry red Strat copy, and joined an existing skiffle band called the Detours in need of a lead singer. They told him he had to bring a guitar, and within a few weeks he showed up with it, and he could play it too. When his father bought him an Epiphone guitar in 1959, he became the lead guitarist for the band and soon afterwards he was expelled from school for smoking. Describing the post-war times, Townshend wrote in his autobiography, "until he was expelled Roger had been a good pupil." Daltrey became a sheet metal worker during the day, while practising and performing nights with the band at weddings, pubs and working men's clubs. He invited schoolmate Entwistle to play bass in the band, and on the advice of Entwistle, invited Townshend to play guitar. At that time, the band also had Doug Sandom on drums and Colin Dawson on lead vocals. After Dawson left the band, Daltrey switched to lead vocals and played harmonica as well, while Townshend became the lead guitarist. In 1964 drummer Sandom left the band, eventually being replaced by Keith Moon. Early on, Daltrey was the band's leader, earning a reputation for using his fists to exercise control when needed, despite his small stature (his height is reportedly 5 feet 7 inches (1.70 m)). According to Townshend, Roger "ran things the way he wanted. If you argued with him, you usually got a bunch of fives" (slaps or punches). He generally selected the music they performed, including songs by the Beatles, various Motown artists, James Brown and rock standards. In 1964 the group discovered another band working as the Detours and discussed changing their name. Townshend suggested "the Hair" and Townshend's roommate Richard Barnes suggested "the Who." The next morning, Daltrey made the decision for the band, saying "It's the Who, innit?" During 1964, band manager Peter Meaden renamed the band to "the High Numbers" as part of a move to establish the band as Mod favourites. The name was a reference to the T-shirts with "numbers" that the Mods used at the time. Peter Meaden composed Mod songs for them (in fact, the songs were almost copies of Mod hits at the time, with changed lyrics) and they released one single, "I'm The Face/Zoot Suit", on Fontana Records. The single proved to be unsuccessful. After Kit Lambert and Chris Stamp discovered the High Numbers at the Railway Hotel, the band changed their name back to the Who, since neither Lambert nor Stamp liked the name the "High Numbers". --- After the Who retired from active work in 1982, Daltrey developed his career in film and on the theatre stage. Daltrey's appearances in over 30 feature films include early starring roles in Tommy, as "deaf, dumb and blind boy" Tommy Walker in 1975; Lisztomania, as Hungarian composer Franz Liszt in 1975, and McVicar, as British armed-robber-turned-journalist John McVicar in 1980. Through the 1980s and 1990s, he appeared in various musicals and dramas, including The Beggar's Opera, The Comedy of Errors, The Little Match Girl, Mack the Knife and Buddy's Song. In 1992 Daltrey appeared in The Real Story of Happy Birthday to You, a children's animation. In 2003, he starred as the voice of Argon the Dragon Bus Driver in the award-winning children's DVD called The Wheels on the Bus: Mango and Papaya's Animal Adventure from Armstrong Moving Pictures. The DVD featured Daltrey as a costumed children's dragon, who drove a bus for two lost puppets trying to return to their home at the zoo. Daltrey provided vocals for children's classics, such as "The Wheels on the Bus Go Round and Round," in addition to songs written specifically for the home video. He later appeared in two other videos for this series. In addition to his career as an actor, Daltrey has been producer on several films, including:Buddy's Song (1990), McVicar (1980), Quadrophenia (1979) and an untitled Keith Moon film project in development. --- Daltrey has been married twice. In 1964, he married the former Jacqueline "Jackie" Rickman, and had one child, born in 1964, Simon. The couple divorced in 1968. In 1967, Daltrey's son Mathias was born, the result of an affair with Swedish model Elisabeth Aronsson. In 1968, he met the American Heather Taylor, his current wife whom he married in 1971. Together, they have three children, Rosie Lea (born in 1972), Willow Amber (born in 1975) and Jamie (born in 1981).