Tony Bennett is an American singer of popular music

Traditional pop music

Traditional pop or classic pop or standards music denotes, in general, Western popular music that either wholly predates the advent of rock and roll in the mid-1950s, or to any popular music which exists concurrently to rock and roll but originated in a time before the appearance of rock and roll,...

, standards, show tune

Show tune

A show tune is a popular song originally written as part of the score of a "show" , especially if the piece in question has become a "standard", more or less detached in most people's minds from the original context...

s, and jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

.

Raised in New York City, Bennett began singing at an early age. He fought in the final stages of World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 as an infantryman with the U.S. Army in the European Theatre. Afterwards, he developed his singing technique, signed with Columbia Records

Columbia Records

Columbia Records is an American record label, owned by Japan's Sony Music Entertainment, operating under the Columbia Music Group with Aware Records. It was founded in 1888, evolving from an earlier enterprise, the American Graphophone Company — successor to the Volta Graphophone Company...

, and had his first number one popular song with "Because of You

Because of You (1940 song)

"Because of You" is a popular song. It was written by Arthur Hammerstein and Dudley Wilkinson in 1940. It was used in the 1951 film I Was an American Spy....

" in 1951. Several top hits such as "Rags to Riches

Rags to Riches (song)

"Rags to Riches" is a 1953 popular song by Richard Adler and Jerry Ross. The best-known version of the song was recorded by Tony Bennett and reached number one on the Billboard chart in 1953. In the same year, a version by David Whitfield reached number three in the British charts...

" followed in the early 1950s.