HAMDEN, CT - Five Satins lead singer Fred Parris collapsed on stage Friday night at Hamden High School during a doo-wop concert that was part of the Hamden Arts Commission’s free Summer Concert Series, according to eyewitnesses. Parris and the Five Satins had just begun their third song of the evening when the 77-year-old began to stagger a bit and had to be helped to a chair and then carried off the stage. An ambulance was summoned and New Haven Register reporter Randy Beach, who was at the concert, said he later saw a conscious Parris being loaded into an ambulance. The show had been moved from Town Center Park, where artists participating in the concert series normally perform, because of concerns about members of the audience being overcome by the heat. Beach said the rest of Five Satins continued performing and finished the concert without Parris. Parris, who lives in Hamden and graduated from Wilbur Cross High School in New Haven, is best known for composing and singing the Five Satins’ best known hit, “In The Still Of The Night,” which climbed the charts to No. 3 on Top 40 radio back in 1956. Hamden police would not confirm whether Parris had collapsed or to which hospital he was taken.
Posted on: Sun, 21 Jul 2013 05:41:38 +0000