I’d seen so many people become stagnant in New Jersey – I had this fear I’d just stay there. They’d come out of high school, get a job, get married, have kids and die in...

The very first time I ever heard anything of mine on the radio, I was in New Jersey, and I was in my teens. I did my first record, which was an old standard called...

You can take the guy out of the neighorhood but you can’t take the neighborhood out of the guy.

They were pretty mobbed up, … It was like the real-life ‘Sopranos.’

The ’60s was a magical time in the music business. So much creativity and talent. I think a lot of it came from the fact that we had grown up before rock n’ roll. We...

When we were trying to get ‘Jersey Boys’ off the ground, I’d get, ‘The Four Seasons? Who’s going to care? There’s the Beatles, there’s the Rolling Stones.’ But people know those stories. Here was a...

I went to school to learn to be a hairdresser. I worked at a wholesale florist, where I delivered to florists all over New Jersey. I’d come home and go out to work down at...

Jersey Boys

When I was a kid, I used to listen to my Emerson radio late at night under the covers. I started by listening to jazz in the late 1940s and then vocal harmony groups like...

With ‘Sherry,’ we were looking for a sound. We wanted to make the kind of mark that, if the radio was playing one of our songs, you knew who it was immediately. But I didn’t...

People don’t get married to get divorced. Maybe people weren’t meant to be together forever.

I was always friends with Nick,

When somebody is making a movie about your life, that’s different. A show is a live performance. Things are going to go wrong. You are going to get away with things. A movie is indelible....

I spent many a summer early morning with the radio very low, half sleeping and half listening.

In 1967, I found out I was losing my hearing. I went 10 years without any help. I had otosclerosis – hardening of the bone in the middle of the ear.

I always believed a singer should be able to sing any kind of song. If I wanted to sing a Cole Porter song, I should be able to do that. Or ‘Sherry,’ I should be...

He was an easy guy to love but hard to understand.

At school, I’d sing in groups in the locker room or in the bathroom, which was like an echo chamber. The problem is I didn’t know how to get started singing professionally. The pool hall...

I grew up beyond proud – we didn’t have much, but we had a lot of love.

I thought everybody had falsetto. And since I wasn’t a schooled singer who studied with anybody, I just thought anybody who had a voice could do anything they wanted with their voice.

I cherish the memory of being a friend of Frank Sinatra on a friendship level to the point where we really hung out. We worked in Vegas, we’d talk on the phone, and if I...

The way the lyric, ?you’re just too good to be true I can’t take my eyes off you.? It’s just magical.

I do belong to Jersey. There’s no doubt about that in my mind. They have been so loyal and so good to me; how could I possibly belong any place else?

Starting in my teens, I was always standing on the corner near our apartment singing harmony with friends. We’d also go to the park and sing under the bridge near the lake for the echo....

‘Jersey Boys’ has been the most amazing experience ever and has exposed an entire new audience to the music. It’s great to see people of all ages coming to the show.

I have to believe that most people know that ‘Can’t Take My Eyes Off Of You’ is my song. But the reaction we get from the audience at ‘Jersey Boys’ is that they didn’t remember...

My name actually is Francesco Castaluccio.

It’s unconditional love with your kids.

There were a lot of R&B groups that were my heroes, but the funny thing about my career and the way it went and where it went, at first I didn’t really want to do...

I learned by listening to other people sing and doing impressions of them. And there are things no one can ever teach you, like phrasing. By listening to Sinatra, for instance – you felt that...

Where I grew up, in New Jersey, there was a lot of organised crime activity. It was a part of life.

I don’t play golf or tennis, I don’t ski, I don’t snowboard. If you love what you do, you never get enough of it.

I think he’s as close as I could possibly imagine, … But it’s still a strange feeling. At first it was very uncomfortable, and then you kind of get used to it.

I think Lady Gaga is talented. Madonna is talented, and the flair that Michael Jackson had. He was talented! Whatever it is that they do, they must be doing something right. They do have an...

Establishing a style is important, it really is, but a lot of singers get so involved with their instrument, and more so than they do in what they’re singing. I think you really have to...

I’m not doing contemporary songs unless something comes along that really knocks my socks off.

We don’t know that but how do you develop that? We develop them by using them.

If I close my eyes, I can remember the first apartment where I lived with my family in Newark, N.J., in the late 1930s. The rooms were lined up like train cars – you had...

It’s always very special for me to work Chicago. Both of the record companies I was with, early on, were based in Chicago. The music was always huge there.

It was very important to establish a sound, so that people heard a record on the radio and knew immediately that it was you.

I was always friends with Nick. You sell a hundred million records and see how you handle it!

Becoming successful is a relentless pursuit. It’s good that it’s that way: When it does come, you learn to know how to appreciate it, and know how lucky you are to be doing something that...

One day, when I was still living at home, a friend told ‘Texas’ Jean Valli about me. She was originally from Syracuse, N.Y., and lived in New Jersey but sang country. One night, she had...

Jazz was my first love.

Tommy gave me my first chance on stage. And I won’t forget it.