John Rocca
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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John Rocca (born 23 September 1960) is a British businessman who became known first as a dance music performer, remixer and record producer. During the early 1980s, Rocca formed, played with, wrote for, produced and managed his first band, Freeez. After his entrepreneurial first self-funded and self-released effort, "Keep in Touch", became a No. 49 hit in the UK Singles Chart, his next effort, "Southern Freeez", was a chart success in various countries in Europe and around the world, reaching No. 8 in the UK Singles Chart.
During 1983, one of the first records to use digital sampling, "IOU", featured Rocca's falsetto voice and became one of the major dance successes of the 1980s electro music style. It scored number one in dance charts in Europe and the US Billboard Hot Dance Music/Club Play and had popular music chart success across the world, spending three weeks at number 2 in the UK.
As a solo artist, Rocca scored number one again, this time with "I Want It To Be Real", on the US Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart during 1984. Rocca retired from the music business during 1993. His last solo recording, using the pseudonym Midi Rain, reached No. 1 on the Billboard US Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart with Shine.
After 1993, John became an accomplished IT specialist, with a first-class honours degree in Information Technology with Spanish, from Middlesex University London, England. He then became a share holder as Global Operations Director of the DOTCOM Technology Start Up Intec Telecom Systems that launched its IPO successfully on the London Stock Exchange in 2001 and from there moved into various senior roles in telecommunications and IT.
See also
- List of number-one dance hits (United States)
- List of number-one dance hits (UK)
- List of artists who reached number one on the US Dance chart
