Singer Noel Harrison has died at his home in Devon,
aged 79.
The son of the
actor Rex Harrison, he was best known for recording the hit song The Windmills
Of Your Mind on The Thomas Crown Affair soundtrack.
It won best
song at the 1968 Oscars and was later covered by artists including Dusty
Springfield.
Harrison spent
much of his life in America, as an actor and performer, but moved back to the
UK in the last decade or so to live in South Devon.
He once said,
of recording The Windmills Of Your Mind: "It didn't seem like a big deal
at the time. I went to the studio one afternoon and sang it and pretty much
forgot about it."
Harrison
continued: "I didn't realise until later what a timeless, beautiful piece
Michel LeGrand and the Bergmans had written. It turned out to be my most
notable piece of work."
After moving to
the US, he starred in the TV series The Girl from UNCLE and had chart hits with
A Young Girl and Suzanne, by Leonard Cohen.
On his website
he wrote: "I was part of the 'British Invasion' spearheaded by The
Beatles. I bought a nice house in Los Angeles.
"There was
another US charts record and four years of endless TV appearances, theatre
tours and star-studded social occasions."
However he
revealed he "didn't like being a celebrity" and spent his sixties
mixing performing with construction work before moving back to the UK, adding,
"I was well out of the goldfish bowl and I liked it."
Ski champion
Harrison was
born in London on 29 January 1934, to Rex Harrison and his mother, Collette
Thomas, the first of six Mrs Rex Harrisons.
They later divorced and he lived in Bude, Cornwall,
with his mother's parents before she took him to live in the Swiss Alps at 15.
Harrison never went to school again but indulged his
passion for ski-racing instead, becoming British champion in 1953.
He was married three times and had children and
grandchildren from his first two marriages.
An admirer of Jacques Brel, Harrison created a
one-man musical, Adieu, Jacques in the 1980s and, in 2002, released an album of
songs from the show.
Harrison played Glastonbury Festival's Spirit of '71
stage in 2011, marking 40 years since his first appearance at the festival.
Source: BBC
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