Ruby Murray
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Ruby Murray (March 29, 1935 - December 17, 1996) was a popular singer born in Belfast, Northern Ireland. Her characteristic hoarse voice was a result of an operation on her throat in early childhood. She toured as a child singer, and first appeared on television at the age of 12. Her first single was Heartbeat, which reached the UK top 5 in 1954. The next, Softly, Softly, reached number 1 in 1955, a year in which Murray achieved the rare feat of having five singles in the top twenty at the same time.
She married Bernie Burgess and moved to England in 1957. After her first marriage failed she married Ray Lamar and lived in Torquay, Devon. She died of liver cancer in December 1996 after a period of illness.
A play by Marie Jones about Murray's life, Ruby, opened at the Group Theatre in Belfast in April 2000.
Her name lives on in Cockney rhyming slang as the rhyme for curry, usually with the usage ruby rather than the phrase in full.
She starred with Frankie Howerd in her only film rôle as Ruby in the 1956 farce A Touch of the Sun
