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Date of Birth
1930, Long Beach, California, USA

Nickname
Batman

Spouse
Jeanne Black (1999 - present)
Joan O'Brien (1954 - 1955) (divorced) 1 child
Joan O'Brien (195? - 195?) (divorced)

Trivia

Wrote the songs "Limbo Rock," "I Think I Love You" and "These Boots Are Made for Walking."

Married briefly in the 1950s to singer/actress Joan O'Brien. His present wife, Jeanne Black, was also a singer. They first connected in the 1950s, but didn't reconnect until almost 40 years later. They married in 1999.

Tall, good-looking Grammy nominee and Gold Record musician/guitarist who has served as a writer, arranger, conductor, producer, publisher, and performer.

Started performing with his mother and father, cowboy entertainers George and Billie Strange, on radio as a young boy and won a yodeling contest. Initially played trumpet but gravitated to guitar, and later became a staff guitarist and boy singer for CBS radio, only to become one of the finest studio musicians of his time (playing for, among others, The Beach Boys, The Monkees and The Ventures.

Heard on the soundtracks of many Disney features, Strange also built up durable associations with both Elvis Presley and Nancy Sinatra as a writer and scorer and played themes for such TV shows as "The Munsters" (1964), "Batman" (1966) and "Have Gun - Will Travel" (1957).

Generally credited with inventing the "fuzz" or "feedback" guitar sound, which occurred when rehearsing his guitar solo on the rock song "Zip-a-Dee-Doo Dah" by Bobb B. Sox and the Blue Jeans in the mid-1960s. Halfway through his solo the guitar's speaker malfunctioned. He liked the distorted, far-away sound that came out of the broken speaker, and "fine-tuned" it to magnify it when he recorded the actual solo. The song was a hit, and many guitarists began copying his "fuzz" sound on their records.

He is the guitarist heard on the theme to "The Munsters".


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