- Sister of singer/actor Nino Tempo
- She was an American singer best known for her collaborations with her younger brother, Nino Tempo.
- As pop performers with a bent for Tin Pin Alley material, though, the brother-sister (despite their different last names) duo was kind of stuck between generations, especially two months after their number one hit "Deep Purple," when the Beatles made the top of the hit parade.
- Stevens recorded from the time she was twenty-two years old.
- In the early '60s, she and her brother Nino teamed up as a duo, signing with Atco.
- Her most popular solo recording was her RCA Victor recording of "I'm in Love Again" (music and lyrics by Cole Porter). Accompanied by an orchestra arranged and conducted by Henri René, Stevens' recording peaked at No. 6 on the pop chart in 1951.
- In the Netherlands, the duo April Stevens and Nino Tempo enjoyed a No. 5 hit in early 1973 with their version of "(Where Do I Begin?) Love Story".
- Her version of the song 'Deep Purple', sung with her brother, won the 1963 Grammy Award for Best Rock and Roll Recording. It sold over one million copies and was awarded a Gold disc.
- The duo's (April Stevens and Nino Tempo) greatest triumph was "All Strung Out," a 1966 Top 30 hit that rates as one of the greatest Phil Spector-inspired productions of all time. It was originally offered to the Righteous Brothers as a follow-up for the Spector-produced "You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin,'" explaining the Wall of Sound ambience to a large degree; John Travolta, of all people, would take it into the Top 40 in the late '70s. No other hits were forthcoming for Tempo & Stevens, although they continued to record for years.
- Stevens returned to the U.S. chart in 1959 with the song "Teach Me Tiger", which caused a minor uproar for its sexual suggestiveness and consequently did not receive airplay on many radio stations. The song peaked at No. 86 on the Billboard Hot 100. The tune was featured in the 2006 film Blind Dating, the 2011 Flemish drama film "North Sea Texas", in season 5, episode 7 of Call the Midwife, and recurs throughout season 1 of the Russian thriller series To the Lake.
- The song "Deep Purple" was recorded in a mere 15 minutes at the end of a session, explaining the almost improvised nature of the vocals (with Stevens taking long spoken passages) and homespun harmonica, ingredients which gave the record much of its charm.
- Nino Tempo & April Stevens's relation to rock was pretty tenuous; after all, most of their early and mid-'60s hits were updates of popular standards like "Deep Purple," "Whispering," "Stardust," and "Tea for Two.".
- Stevens was best known for her 1963 Atco Records recording of "Deep Purple" (music by Peter DeRose and lyrics by Mitchell Parish) with her brother Antonino LoTempio (singing under the stage name Nino Tempo). It was a standard song that Larry Clinton and His Orchestra and band vocalist Bea Wain had popularized in 1939. The Stevens and Tempo version reached No.1 on the Hot 100 on November 16, 1963, and No.17 in the British charts.
- She and her brother also enjoyed a 1964 hit in the U.S. with the standard song "Whispering" (music by Vincent Rose and lyrics by Richard Coburn (pseudonym of Frank Reginald DeLong; 1886-1952) and John Schonberger). The recording, which had an arrangement similar to their recording of "Deep Purple", reached No. 11 on the Hot 100 singles chart.
- She and her brother Nino attended the San Remo Music Festival in Italy with Frankie Laine and Ben E. King, toured Germany and England and sang 'Deep Purple' in Italian on Italian TV.
- Stevens also released "Sleep Baby Sleep," a controversial song about a 34 year-old woman hovering over her 21 year-old lover. The song, retitled "Wake Up And Love Me," was released under her first name only, and made it into the Hot 100 in 1974.
- Her mother had won a beauty contest when she was only 16, but a strict Italian father and brood of six younger sisters to care for combined to thwart whatever girlish dreams she might have entertained. But those very dreams were later to be lived out and realized through her children.
- Stevens has recorded since she was 15 years old.
- Her mother later co-wrote a song with April called 'Together (We'll Always Be).'.
- In 1999, she and her brother were inducted into the Buffalo Music Hall of Fame.
- While she was still in high school, she went on to record "Don't Do It" for Society Records, a song which was banned from airplay because of its suggestive lyrics. However, the song did lead her to success in another way, as Henri Rene, of RCA, heard "Don't Do It" and was drawn to the sound of her vocals, asking her to record with him.
- She and her brother have a connection to heavy metal music in an indirect way. In 1967, Chris Curtis, the former drummer of Searchers decided to put together a new band, to be called Roundabout. While the band was on a tour of Denmark and Sweden, still under the name of Roundabout, Richie Blackmore, the band's guitarist, suggested they adopt a new name, and after each band member posted a name suggestion on a board, they decided on Deep Purple, the name of Blackmore's grandmother's favorite song; however, keep in mind that April and Nino were not the first to record the song.
- In June 1951, Henri Rene released Cole Porter's "I'm in Love Again," with Stevens as the featured vocalist. The song remained on the charts for 15 weeks and peaked at No. 6. She recorded her follow up, "Give Me a Little Kiss Will Ya, Huh?" which reached No. 10, and then she covered Patti Page's "And So To Sleep Again," which hit No. 27.
- The owner of Laurel Records, Tony Sepe, asked her to record a song called "No, No, No, Not That." At the time she was still in high school, and the song was a bit racy, and under the suggestion that she needed to protect her own name, she chose the first name April because she liked the name; as for the last name, it was the name of someone who worked at the label.
- In 1961, she recorded "Love Kitten," another suggestive song, which included purring sounds. The song did not hit the national charts, though it did have regional success.
- During the "Paradise" recording session, April had the idea to sing "Deep Purple," a standard made popular by Larry Clinton and His Orchestra and band vocalist Bea Wain in 1939. As they rehearsed, Nino decided to sing a verse by himself, but he couldn't remember the words. April began saying them, softly, as a cue. A girl walked in as this was happening, and she really liked the style of April speaking the lyrics, while Nino sang them. They had 14 minutes of studio time remaining, so they recorded it.
- April was also a songwriter--charting 3 times with songs she wrote--including #41 in the U.K. with "A Woman's Story" by Marc Almond in 1986 (co-written with brother Nino and Phil Spector).
- At her parent's encouragement, she began entering talent shows and singing contests when she was about eight years old. "Luckily," she modestly said, "I won almost all of them.".
- By 1961, using the stage name Nino Tempo, April's younger brother had started to do more L.A. session work with Bobby Darin and Phil Spector. While Nino was working in the sessions with Bobby Darin, Ahmet Ertegun, the Atlantic Records VIP, overheard Nino at the piano, and inquired about him, learning that he was April Stevens' brother. After hearing the two perform, Ertegun helped them to release "Sweet and Lovely," their first recording on ATCO. It hit No. 77 on the charts in 1962. Their follow up single "Paradise" only performed moderately well, reaching No. 126.
- When she was 12, her family moved to Los Angeles, California,.
- Her father owned a grocery store and, through hard work, provided the material means for his family to live fairly comfortably--a not inconsiderable task in depression times.
- April, who was then still called Carol, was browsing in record stores, and one day, while she was outside Wallach's Music City, the owner of Laurel Records, Tony Sepe, asked her whether she could sing or not. She said yes, and before long she had changed her name to April and was recording for Laurel Records.
- April Stevens was born Carol Lo Tempio on April 29, 1929 in Niagara Falls, NY, although some websites claim she was born in 1936.
- In her 2013 autobiography, Teach Me Tiger, Stevens said she was born in 1929. She admitted to taking years off her age, and her brother, Nino, going along with it. This was supposedly due to their competition with acts in their late teens and early twenties that were dominating the record charts in the 1960s.
- Born Carol LoTempio to Sam and Anna LoTempio in Niagara Falls, New York, April Stevens and her brother Anthony (Antonino...later Nino) were raised in a middle-class neighborhood by Italian-American parents.
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