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Bobby Darin (born Walden Robert Cassotto; May 14, 1936 – December 20, 1973) was an American singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and actor of film and television. He performed in a range of music genres, including jazz, pop, rock'n'roll, folk, swing and country. He started as a songwriter for Connie Francis, and recorded his own first million-seller "Splish Splash" in 1958. This was followed by "Dream Lover", "Mack the Knife", and "Beyond the Sea", which brought him world fame. In 1962, he won a Golden Globe Award for his first film ''Come September'', co-starring his first wife, Sandra Dee. Throughout the 1960s, he became more politically active and worked on Robert F. Kennedy's Democratic presidential campaign. He was present on the night of June 4/5, 1968, at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles at the time of Kennedy's assassination. The same year, he discovered that he had been brought up by his grandmother, not his mother, and that the girl he had thought to be his sister was actually his mother. These events deeply affected Darin and sent him into a long period of seclusion. Although he made a successful television comeback, his health was beginning to fail, as he had always expected, following bouts of rheumatic fever in childhood. This knowledge of his vulnerability had always spurred him on to exploit his musical talent while still young. He died at age 37, following a heart operation in Los Angeles. ==Early years== Born Walden Robert Cassotto in the East Harlem neighborhood of New York City,〔''Dream Lovers'', pp. 9-10〕 Bobby Darin was reared by his maternal grandmother, whom he thought was his mother. Darin's birth mother, Vanina Juliette "Nina" Cassotto (born November 30, 1917), became pregnant with him in the summer of 1935 when she was 18. Presumably because of the scandalous nature of out-of-wedlock pregnancies in that era, Nina and her mother hatched a plan to pass her baby off as her parents' child and for Nina to be passed off as his older sister. Years later when Nina finally told Darin the truth about his upbringing she refused to reveal the identity of his biological father not only to him but to anyone except her mother, and Nina continued to keep that secret even up until her own death in 1983. Darin's maternal grandfather, Saverio Antonio "Big Sam Curly" Cassotto (born January 26, 1882), was of Italian descent and a wannabe mobster, who died in prison from pneumonia a year before Darin's birth. His maternal grandmother, Vivian Fern Walden (also born in 1882), who called herself Polly, was of English ancestry〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Chapter One: The Hidden Child )〕 and a vaudeville singer. From his birth, Darin always believed Nina to be his older sister and Polly his mother. But in 1968, when he was 32, Darin finally learned the shocking truth from Nina that ''she'', not Polly, was his mother. Both the true circumstances of his birth and his relationship with Nina reportedly devastated him.〔(Biography: Bobby Darin ), The Biography Channel. Retrieved August 12, 2007. Also mentioned in the "Bobby Darin" episode of the ''Biography'' series.〕 By the time he was a teenager he could play several instruments, including piano, drums, and guitar. He later added harmonica and xylophone. Darin moved to the Bronx early in his life and graduated from the prestigious Bronx High School of Science. In later years he attributed his arrogance to his experiences at the high school, where he was surrounded by students brighter than himself, who frequently poked fun at him.〔''Dream Lovers'', pp. 16-17〕 He enrolled at Hunter College, gravitating to the drama department, and dropped out after two semesters to pursue an acting career.〔''Dream Lovers'', pp. 22-23〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Bobby Darin」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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