Reparata and the Delrons were an American girl group. They are best known for their 1965 recordings "Whenever a Teenager Cries" and "Tommy", for the 1968 European hit "Captain of Your Ship" and for Reparata's 1975 solo hit "Shoes".
History 1962–1965: Early years The group started out as a high-school harmony group formed in 1962 at St. Brendan's Catholic School in Brooklyn, New York by lead singer Mary Aiese. The other original members were Nanette Licari, Regina Gallagher, and Ann Fitzgerald, and the first line up as the Del-Rons featured Mary Aiese, Sheila Reilly, Carol Drobnicki and Kathy Romeo. Romeo was replaced by Marge McGuire, who herself then left the group. All eight girls graduated from St. Brendan's in the class of 1964.
As a trio, Aiese, Reilly, and Drobnicki were spotted by record producers Bill and Steve Jerome. They asked Mary Aiese to choose a stage name to make the group name more interesting and marketable. She chose Reparata, her confirmation name, which she had taken from one of her favorite teachers at Good Shepherd Catholic grammar school.Interview with Mary O'Leary, Lost and Found, WMBR-FM/88.1, 15 November 2005
The Jeromes recorded them in 1964 first for Laurie Records, then on the Pittsburgh-based World Artists label with Ernie Maresca's song "Whenever a Teenager Cries". The song became a regional hit and reached number 60 on the Billboard Hot 100, and it reached the Top 5 in Canada (where it was distributed by Arc). The follow-up, "Tommy", co-written by Chip Taylor, reached number 92. Writing about "Tommy" in her memoir A Misfit's Manifesto: The Spiritual Journey of a Rock-and-Roll Heart (2003), journalist and sociologist Donna Gaines comments:
The album Whenever a Teenager Cries (1965) showcased the singles, and included covers of popular hits by British Invasion groups including The Beatles' "If I Fell" and Manfred Mann's "Doo Wah Diddy Diddy".
The group opened for The Rolling Stones at the Philadelphia Convention Hall and Civic Center on their Spring 1965 North American tour.
The group became more widely known when they were invited to tour nationally with Dick Clark's Caravan of Stars on two occasions during 1965. Reilly and Drobnicki left the group just before the second tour began, and Reparata performed solo on the tour, with backing vocals from the wings. The next two singles were credited only to Reparata: "A Summer Thought" and "I Found My Place".
1965–1969: Classic line-up, success in Europe
When Reparata and the Delrons signed with RCA in 1965, new members were needed. Original member Nanette Licari was brought back. "I Can Tell", the first single for RCA needed a third vocalist, and although it has been reported that Lesley Gore sang on the track, it was actually session singer Lesley Miller, while Gore recorded her own version of the song. 18-year-old Lorraine Mazzola was soon recruited to join the group.
This line-up of Aiese, Licari, and Mazzola became the group's best-known and most prolific, although ironically they never released an album and none of their dozen singles ever made the US national charts. Their 1967 release "It's Waiting There For You" became a minor hit in Colorado Springs, Colorado, with airplay on KYSN, 1460-AM. After several unsuccessful releases in a style similar to the Shangri-Las, including Jeff Barry's "I'm Nobody's Baby Now," and "I Can Hear the Rain" which featured the then-unknown Melba Moore, the group moved again to Mala Records.
In 1968, they released the up-tempo "Captain of Your Ship", co-written by Kenny Young. Although the song missed the U.S. national charts, it became their biggest ever hit when it made number 13 in the UK Singles Chart, and the group toured there. The trio's backing group on this tour was Clouds. "Saturday Night Didn't Happen" and "Weather Forecast" were also issued as singles, but did not repeat the success of "Captain of Your Ship". Young said of this period: '"They were responsible for me moving to England. I accompanied them to Top of the Pops...[and]...attended the reception for their hit single "Captain of Your Ship", along with John Lennon and Ringo at the Revolution Club in London. I met half the Beatles at our own reception...".
"Captain of Your Ship" was popular in many European countries, and was released in Australia and Rhodesia. Footage of the group performing the song live on the Beat-Club show on German television, introduced by Dave Lee Travis is available on video sharing websites. The Beat Club clip shows that Reparata sings lead on the song, not Lorraine Mazzola as reported in some histories of the group. The record's success in Europe led to the group being invited to perform at the Interfestival in Poland in August 1968 alongside British act Julie Driscoll with the Brian Auger Trinity, and Austrian Udo Jürgens as well as acts from Poland, USSR, Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia.Billboard, 6 July 1968
The B-side "Toom Toom is a Little Boy" gave the group the unusual accolade of a release in pre-revolutionary Iran in 1968, on an EP alongside tracks by Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick and Tich, Otis Redding, and Tommy James.
In 1969, the group provided backing vocals for The Rolling Stones' single "Honky Tonk Women", recorded at Olympic Studios in London, and for the Ox-Bow Incident cover of The Four Tops' "Reach Out".
The group filmed a lip-sync performance of their May 1969 single "San Juan" for Hy Lit's show syndicated by WKBS-TV in Philadelphia. A recording of the performance was available on YouTube in March 2021, but it was later removed.
The group's 18th and final single was released in September 1969. A cover of The Ronettes' "Walking in the Rain", its potential to be a hit was challenged when Jay and the Americans released their own version the following month, which reached number 19 in the Billboard charts. The latter group acknowledged the issue by having "Sorry Reparata" etched into the record's vinyl.
1969–1973: Delrons without Reparata Mary Aiese married in 1969. She took her husband's name and became Mary O'Leary.Mick Patrick, booklet in 2005 Ace Records Best of compilation She decided to stop doing live shows and to concentrate on starting a family and on her separate career as a schoolteacher.
Mary O'Leary agreed that Lorraine Mazzola and Nanette Licari would carry on without her doing live shows as The Delrons. They recruited Helaine Tobias, who performed as Cooky, and with Lorraine Mazzola on lead vocals they performed Reparata and the Delrons' back catalogue. The musicians who played with the live group from this time included Dave Camacho (keyboard), Augie Ciulla (drums), Frank Franco (guitar), Frankie Pelligrino (sax) and Cooky's future husband Joe Sirico (bass).
O'Leary had already recorded some lead vocals for the group's second LP, 1970 Rock'n'Roll Revolution, which is a collection of covers of pop standards songs of the 1950s and 1960s, and these tracks were included on the album. The album cover artwork shows the new line-up without Mary O'Leary, and the other band members also took some lead vocals on the album. The vocal arrangements on the album are credited to Lorraine Mazzola.
During her time as lead singer, Lorraine Mazzola began to introduce herself as Reparata. The live shows stopped in 1973 when Mazzola joined Barry Manilow's back-up singers Lady Flash. In Lady Flash, Mazzola began to use the stage name "Reparata Mazzola", and has done so ever since.
Cooky Sirico and Nanette Licari did not continue with the group after Lorraine Mazzola left, and Reparata and the Delrons went on hiatus as a live act in 1973.
1971–1976: Reparata's solo career While The Delrons played live shows without her, Mary O'Leary continued to release new Reparata solo singles produced by Steve and Bill Jerome, who had worked on all the group's records since 1964.
"There's So Little Time" was released as Big Tree 114 in 1971, written by Rupert Holmes and Danny Jordan. The B-side is "Just You" written by the Jeromes and K. Stella.
In February 1972, Mary O'Leary signed a three-year contract with Dart Records, a UK-based label.Shoes is on Firm Footing after Copyright Settlement, Billboard magazine, 1975 Dart quickly released "Octopus's Garden" (Dart ART 2006), a cover version of The Beatles song. The recording is credited to Reparata and the Delrons, although only Mary O'Leary is on the recording, not any of the Delrons who were still playing live in the United States at that time. The B-side is "Your Life is Gone", a dramatic story song similar to The Shangri-La's' "Leader of the Pack". In the United States, it was released on Laurie Records, who had released the Delrons first single back in 1964. The production of "Octopus's Garden" uses some vocal effects and sound effects to recapture the quirky mood and sound of the groups' earlier recordings like "Captain of Your Ship" and "Weather Report", and "Your Life is Gone" includes some car-crash and ambulance sound effects like "Leader of the Pack". References to the Beatles and the Shangri-Las, and allusions to the group's own previous hits, seemed dated in 1972, and the record was not a hit.
To capitalize on Reparata's new material for Dart, the group's 1968 UK hit "Captain of Your Ship" / "Toom Toom Is a Little Boy" (Bell Records BL 1252) was rereleased there in July 1972, but it did not make the charts this time.
In 1974, a remake of the group's 1964 hit "Whenever a Teenager Cries" was released as on the North American Music Industries label as NAMI 2024. As ever, it was produced by the Jeromes and arranged by John Abbott. It has a mono recording on one side and a stereo recording on the other. It featured only Reparata, although credited to the group. It may have been the original vocal with an overdubbed country guitar.
On 18 October 1974, Mary O'Leary released a Reparata solo single "Shoes", backed with "A Song for All", as a UK-only promo on Surrey International Records as SIT 5013. Reparata's contract with Dart Records ended in February 1975, and "Shoes" was then given a commercial release on her new label Polydor in the summer of that year. While the single was drawing praise for its catchy and unique sound, promotion and distribution were hampered by two legal disputes.
First, there was a dispute over the name Reparata. Mary O'Leary had used the name since her confirmation as a teenager, and as her stage name since 1964, first as lead singer of Reparata and the Delrons until 1969, then afterwards as a solo performer. Former bandmate Lorraine Mazzola was now also using the name, having taken over from O'Leary as lead singer at live shows between 1969 and 1973. After this line-up disbanded, Mazzola continued to use the name when working as Barry Manilow's back-up singer, benefiting from the impression that Mazzola had been the lead voice of the still fondly-remembered girl group Reparata and the Delrons.
When Mary O'Leary released "Shoes" in 1975, with Mazzola now also singing with as Reparata with Barry Manilow, this caused a problem. In a 2005 radio interview, Mary O'Leary explained that this seriously affected the success of "Shoes" because the record had to be removed from sale during the case: "When the record came out, being done by Reparata, the record was squashed because, quote unquote, Reparata was with Barry Manilow. Believe me, it's a whole big megillah...".Interview with Mary "Reparata" O'Leary, Lost and Found, WMBR-FM/88.1, 15 November 2005 O'Leary won the case when Mazzola did not come to the hearing.
Second, and separate from the dispute over the name Reparata, Dart Records disputed Polydor's right to the master tapes of "Shoes", which had been recorded during O'Leary's contract with Dart. This dispute was settled out of court and the single was eventually released on 8 August 1975 on both Dart and Polydor with one catalogue number.