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Peter Lemongello is an American singer from Islip, Long Island, New York. In 1976, he became the first person to sell a million records through a television direct marketing campaign. He also was the first entertainer to underwrite a television direct Ad campaign selling shares in the project to private investors.

Using a city-by-city marketing strategy, he and his partners began their Love ‘76, Ad campaign on late-night TV in New York, New York on January 1, 1976 targeting all six New York metropolitan channels 70 to 100 times a week. The album, Do I Love You, a two-record set took off slowly at first selling 43,000 copies in New York, Connecticut and New Jersey in 13 weeks. After signing with Private Stock Records, in April 1976 they began the same campaign in Los Angeles and Las Vegas and the album began to sell on an unprecedented level attracting widespread media attention.

Lemongello came up with the idea after a failed cabaret career and repeated appearances on national TV including three on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson. After the success of the Ad campaign he performed at Carnegie Hall, Madison Square Garden and The Lincoln Center For The Performing Arts.

Lemongello was spoofed in the episode of Saturday Night Live that originally aired May 22, 1976, with Chevy Chase playing a singer named Peter Lemon Moodring. Chase would also invoke Peter Lemongello as an alias in his 1989 movie Fletch Lives.

The Love '76 commercial was parodied by recording artist Will Dailey in May, 2009. This video captures the scene of two sterotypical show business managers coercing Dailey to appear in a TV advertisement for his new album, Torrent, so that he can recreate the success of Peter Lemongello, Zamfir and Slim Whitman. The commercial itself is a scene-by-scene recreation of the original Lemongello spot that first aired on television in 1976.

Lemongello continued his career appearing in Branson, Missouri. Billed as Branson's "Italian Crooner". Most recently Peter has adopted "The Great American Songbook" and appears frequently across the country.

References

External links

• The Official Peter Lemongello Website
• “The $390,000 Man” Time Magazine; Monday, 31 May 1976 Retrieved 9 May 2007
• The Official Peter Lemongello MySpace Music Page
• Will Dailey's "Mood Rock" video

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