Entertainer Rudy Boyce passed away yesterday at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital.
His wife Dorin told The Nation her husband was hospitalised for some time after contracting pneumonia last year. The 87-year-old was diagnosed with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), the inflammatory disease that obstructs the airflow from the lungs, and is characterised by difficulty breathing, coughing and mucus. He was on portable oxygen “24-7”.
Boyce was born in Trinidad and Tobago in 1937 to Barbadian parents. He spent the first five years here before relocating to the twin-island republic. He started singing in the church and later won a radio contest in Trinidad.
Ironically, if he had pursued his dream of being a sportsman, the world would have been robbed of his voice.
“I wanted to be an athlete and take part in the 1960 Olympics. In those days the athletes got all the girls, not the singers,” he said in an interview with the Weekend Nation in 1993.
Thanks to two Canadian couples who heard him sing, he got a break in 1965 and worked and performed in Canada for two years. He returned to Trinidad and Tobago, then went to Barbados with The Fantastics.
Boyce performed around the world – England, Hong Kong, Germany, Switzerland – for many years. He married Brit Dorin in 1982, two years after they met. They lived in England for 15 years where he worked the nightclub scene and the stageshow Black Heroes in The Hall of Fame at Hackney Empire Theatre.
Here in Barbados, he was best known for renditions of Red, Red Wine; Pretty Flamingo and Lets’ Make Love (One More Time With Feeling) in his distinct baritone.
The couple had no children, but Boyce had one son who lives in the United States, as well as family in Trinidad and Tobago and here in St Lucy.
After he retired from performing, Boyce supported Dorin, a retired canine expert, in running the Woodbourne Boarding and Rescue Kennels at their home in St Philip. (SAT)
