Prudence Ann McIntyre obit

Prudence Ann McIntyre

JULY 12, 1945 – SEPTEMBER 15, 2023

Prudence Ann McIntyre, age 78, of Burbank, California passed away on Friday, September 15, 2023. 

She was not on the list.

Patience Ann McIntyre (born August 15, 1942) and Prudence Ann McIntyre (July 12, 1945 – September 15, 2023), known professionally as Patience and Prudence, were two sisters who were a young vocal duo active from 1956 to 1964.

Patience and Prudence McIntyre were born in 1942 and 1945, respectively, in Los Angeles, California. Their father Mark McIntyre was an orchestra leader, pianist, and songwriter who worked with Frank Sinatra in the 1940s. Patience was named after a woman who authored poetry for The Ladies’ Home Journal in the 1920s, and her younger sister Prudence’s name was selected as one that fit with her older sister’s. As youngsters, the girls studied piano and learned to read music. In the summer of 1956, their father brought 11-year-old Prudence and 14-year-old Patience into the Liberty Records studio in Los Angeles.

The duo made a demonstration recording of the song, “Tonight You Belong to Me,” which had been a hit for Gene Austin in 1927, and was written by Billy Rose and Lee David. Liberty signed them and immediately released a recording of the girls singing the song as a commercial single (with the B-side, “A Smile and a Ribbon,” a composition with music by Mark McIntyre) and by September the song reached #4 on the Billboard charts and #28 in the UK Singles Chart, and was the biggest selling record put out by Liberty for two years. It sold over one million copies and reached gold record status. It went on to become one of the best-selling in-store singles in the United States in September 1956.

They released several other singles on the Chattahoochee Records label, including a 1964 re-recording of “Tonight You Belong to Me”. In 1978, they reunited to appear on a Dick Clark television feature and stated that they both didn’t want to be performers in the first place and that their success was just an “accident”. They also stated that their father didn’t want them to be in the spotlight for personal reasons so he declined all other television and commercial offers, which prevented both of the girls from furthering their professional music careers.

Prudence McIntyre died on September 15, 2023, at the age of 78.