‘Having a one night stand doesn’t mean you don’t love your wife’

"The thing about being unfaithful or having a one night stand, it doesn't mean you don't love your wife," says 78-year-old showband legend, Dickie Rock.

There was “a lot of temptation” in the heady days he spent performing to packed-out ballrooms in the 1960s and 1970s, with crowds of women throwing themselves at him. So, has he ever succumbed to weakness?

“Oh of course I have. I regret it from the point of view of my wife Judy. I would regret it very much so. She forgave me. She knew I loved her,” he told Róisín Ingle, presenter of the Róisín Meets podcast.

A working class lad from Cabra on Dublin's north side, Dickie Rock was one of the biggest stars of Ireland's hugely popular showband scene as part of the Miami Showband and later as a solo artist, with a sex symbol status to rival Beatlemania.

In the beginning, his father didn’t quite know what to make of the hordes of girls hanging outside the family home hoping to catch a glimpse of his son. Dickie said he didn’t understand it himself for a while.

It is a drug… I'm addicted to the audience. The applause, the look when you're singing a nice song."

“I was never good looking. I used to come home and look at myself in the mirror and think, what’s happening here? But I realised that when I hit the stage something happens, even before I start singing.”

From ‘Richard Rock, Boy Soprano’, to ‘spit on me Dickie’, to charity gigs in nursing homes, Rock said his love for performing has never waned.

“It is a drug… I’m addicted to the audience. The applause, the look when you’re singing a nice song.”

He still packs out the big venues too and will play Vicar Street in Dublin tomorrow night. It is a privilege to still have the opportunity to do that at 78 years of age, but the money doesn’t hurt either, he said.

“It’s very hard to be successful if you’re not committed. Of course I’m doing it for money, but I love it too.”

To listen to the full conversation between Dickie Rock and Róisín Ingle, go to iTunes, irishtimes.com/podcasts, or your preferred podcast app.

You can catch The New Spotlight Live Showband Show featuring Dickie Rock, with special guest Tony Kenny, at Vicar Street, Dublin, March 25; Town Hall Theatre, Galway, April 6; University Concert Hall, Limerick, April 7; Tullamore Court Hotel, Co Offaly, April 9.