Billy Reid

Who was Billy Reid?

Billy Reid was a United Kingdom orchestra leader, songwriter and accordionist. He was one of the biggest show business names of his generation in the UK and beyond. He was one of the most famous bandleaders in London in the 1930s and a top recording star for Decca. No popular music radio show would have been complete without including a Billy Reid song. His songs were recorded by Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, Vera Lynn, the Ink Spots, Peggy Lee, Al Martino and Louis Armstrong. He topped the bill all over the country, especially with Dorothy Squires and he was the first British song-writer to top the US charts, following that first hit by two more US No. 1s. He held that record until the Beatles broke it in the 1960s and his career died with the Beatles, etc., in the Sixties. From massive star and a millionaire songwriter, by 1974, his public had forgotten him and he died penniless, bankrupt, in obscurity from acute kidney disease.