Bobby Lewis

Born in Indianapolis in 1933, Bobby Lewis was raised in an orphanage. He learned to play the piano at age five. He was eventually adopted, and when he was 12 his adoptive family moved to Detroit. He embarked on a singing career as a teenager, and was soon opening for such acts as Jackie Wilson and James Brown. In 1960 Lewis recorded a song that had been written by his friend Ritchie Adams--who had sung with a vocal group called The Fireflies, which had its own hit in the late 1950s with "You Were Mine"--almost a year earlier, called "Tossin' and Turnin'". It was released in 1961 and was an immediate hit, selling more than three million copies and staying in the #1 spot for seven weeks. Shortly after that he followed with "One Track Mind", which broke into the top ten but didn't make the #1 slot.