Les Vandyke

Early life

When John was born, his father, a Greek Cypriot, was determined to christen his son as Yannis Paraskos Skordalides as a Greek Orthodox, but his Welsh mother insisted that he be named John Worsley and christened in the Church of England. The name "Worsley" was chosen by his father during The Wall Street Crash because he feared that he would not be able to get work with a Greek name. He changed it by deed poll. He chose the name "Worsley" by placing a pin at random on a map of England, which landed on Worsley in Greater Manchester. However, in their book, Big Time: The Life Of Adam Faith (2015), the authors David and Caroline Stafford assert that Worth was named Yani Panakos Paraskeva Skoradalides.

AllMusic journalist Bruce Eder states, "Vandyke is one of those rare talents in English pop music whose songwriting success crossed several genres and eras, from the end of the 1950s right into the 1970s".

Career

In his youth he was simply known as John Worsley. After schooling, he began work as a draughtsman prior to his compulsory two years national service which he claims were the happiest two years of his life. Returning to civilian life, he determined to become a singer, changing his name for the purpose to Johnny Worth.

He worked in pubs as a semi-professional until he managed to secure a television appearance. Watching was the wife of well-known leader of the Oscar Rabin Band, and Worth was signed to the band, with whom he remained for five years, making a number of recordings for Oriole Records and Columbia Records. He also recorded for the Embassy Records label, which produced cheap covers of popular hits, usually sold through Woolworth's stores. He then joined the Raindrops vocal quartet (together with Len Beadle, Len's wife Jackie Lee and Vince Hill), which appeared on the television programme Drumbeat and subsequent LP. It was on this show that he met Oscar-winning composer John Barry, with whom he was soon to work, and the singer Adam Faith.

Worth had aspirations to be a songwriter, and though initial attempts had failed, he asked pianist Les Reed to arrange a demo of his song "What Do You Want?". Faith and Barry liked it, and with Barry's arrangements, Faith took the song to number one in the UK Singles Chart in November 1959, within which it remained for nineteen weeks. Worth's concern was that as he was still signed to Oriole, he should adopt a pseudonym, and combined Reed's first name with his own telephone exchange, to become Les Vandyke.

He provided Faith with his follow-up number one "Poor Me", in January 1960, and for the next two years penned a further six Top Ten British chart hits for Faith: "Someone Else's Baby"; "How About That"; "Who Am I"; "The Time Has Come"; "As You Like It" and "Don't That Beat All". Worth also wrote another chart-topper "Well I Ask You" for Eden Kane, a pseudonym for Richard, the eldest of the three Sarstedt brothers, as well as Kane's two follow up hits, "Get Lost" (reached No. 10 – September 1961) and "Forget Me Not" (No. 3 – January 1962).

At least two Vandyke songs were covered by well-known Australian artists: "Doin' The Mod" by Ronnie Burns's band the Flies (1965, first recorded by Vandyke with British band The Bambis, 1964) and "Dance Puppet Dance" by Little Pattie (also 1965, first recorded by Dave Duggan on Columbia in the UK, 1963), which reached number twelve in the Sydney-based pop charts.

Vandyke also wrote music and songs for a number of low-budget movies during the 1960s and 1970s. These included What a Whopper (1961 as Johnny Worth); The Kitchen (1961); Mix Me a Person (1962, as Johnny Worth); Some People (1962 as Johnny Worth – lyricist); Johnny Cool (1963 as Les Vandyke); Psychomania (1973) and The Playbirds (1978 as John Worth); plus Saturday Night and Sunday Morning (1960).

Over the years Vandyke has penned songs that were recorded by various artists, including Petula Clark, Vince Hill, Engelbert Humperdinck, Anthony Newley, Bobby Vee, Shirley Bassey, Herman's Hermits, Marty Wilde, Bobby Rydell, Cleo Laine, Barbra Streisand, Jimmy Justice, John Leyton, Freddie and the Dreamers, Sammy Davis, Jr. and many more.

Vandyke penned more big hit records in the early 1970s. In addition, he wrote and produced "Gonna Make You an Offer You Can't Refuse" a number 8 UK hit in 1973 for the American singer, and one-hit wonder, Jimmy Helms for Cube Records.

During the 1970s Vandyke was one of the directors of the hotel and club venue, the Webbington Country Club, in the Mendips near Weston-super-Mare, Somerset.

In 1986, Vandyke married Catherine Stock, sister of fellow songwriter, Mike Stock. Later that year Vandyke penned her a UK hit, which reached number 17 in the UK Singles Chart, entitled "To Have and To Hold".