Francesco Stephen Castelluccio (born May 3, 1934), better known by his stage name Frankie Valli, is an American singer and occasional actor, best known as the lead vocalist of the Four Seasons. He is known for his unusually powerful countertenor voice.
Valli scored 29 top-40 hits with the Four Seasons, one top-40 hit under the Four Seasons alias the Wonder Who?, and nine top-40 hits as a solo artist. As a member of the Four Seasons, Valli's number-one hits include "Sherry" (1962), "Big Girls Don't Cry" (1962), "Walk Like a Man" (1963), "Rag Doll" (1964), and "December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night)" (1975). His recording of the song "Can't Take My Eyes Off You" reached number two in 1967. As a solo artist, Valli scored number-one hits with the songs "My Eyes Adored You" (1974) and "Grease" (1978).
Valli, Tommy DeVito, Nick Massi, and Bob Gaudio—the original members of the Four Seasons—were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1990 and the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 1999. Valli is also a 2010 inductee of the New Jersey Hall of Fame, with the Four Seasons (Gaudio, Massi, DeVito, and Joe Long) inducted separately in 2017 and Valli speaking on Massi's behalf. Valli was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in May 2024, a joint star for both the Four Seasons and him. Valli appeared in person to accept the honor with his wife and two of his sons, and Gaudio sent a recorded acceptance speech. In February 2025, Valli was awarded a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, his first-ever Grammy.
Valli was born Francesco Castelluccio to an Italian family in Newark, New Jersey; he is the eldest of three sons. Valli's father, Antonio (Anthony) Castelluccio, who was born in Jersey City to parents from Faiano, Salerno, Campania, was a barber and display designer for Lionel model trains; his mother, Donata Maria "Mary" Rinaldi, who immigrated from Avigliano, Potenza, Basilicata, was a homemaker and beer-company employee. His younger brothers are also singers, Alex Castelluccio (who died in 2025) and Bobby Valli, who is 15 years younger than Frankie; Bobby Valli occasionally sang with his brothers and also performed with the Classics IV, The Duprees, Joey Dee and the Starliters and Larry Chance. Valli was inspired to take up a singing career at age seven after Mary took him to see Frank Sinatra at the Paramount Theater in Manhattan, New York City. One of Valli's early favorite singers was "Texas" Jean Valli, from whom Valli took his stage name. Valli worked as a barber until he could support himself with music.
Valli's birth year has been called into question. He never addressed the issue himself until a 2007 posting at the official Frankie Valli site, sponsored by his record label Universal. Much of Valli's previous publicity used 1937 as his birth year, with his bandmates also having their birth dates adjusted later than reality to appeal to a younger demographic. Other sources gave Valli's year of birth as 1934, such as the Bear Family Records release The Four Lovers (BCD 15424) and a 1965 mug shot, available through The Smoking Gun.
Valli began his singing career in 1951 with the Variety Trio (Nickie DeVito, Tommy DeVito, and Henry "Hank" Majewski), and was mentored in much of his early career by Nick Macioci, who later joined Valli in the Four Seasons, and by "Texas" Jean Valli, a female hillbilly singer, from whom he adopted the "Valli" surname. Geoff Herbert explains, "Frankie said in 2010 that Jean took him to meet music publishers Paul and Dave Kapp, telling them he was her brother. As a result, his first single was listed under 'Frankie Valley', and the name stuck—though he eventually changed it to the same spelling" that Texas Jean used. His desire to sing in public was initially granted when the group offered him a guest spot when they performed. In late 1952, the Variety Trio disbanded and Valli and Tommy DeVito became part of the house band at the Strand in New Brunswick, New Jersey. Valli played bass and sang.
Valli recorded his first single, "My Mother's Eyes", in 1953, a cover of the 1929 George Jessel song from Lucky Boy, with his stage name "Frankie Valley." Around this time, Valli, Majewski, and Tommy DeVito left the house band at the Strand and formed the Variatones with Frank Cottone and Billy Thompson. In 1956, the group impressed New York recording agent Peter Paul, and he got them an audition at RCA Victor a week later.
The group changed its name to the Four Lovers and recorded several singles and an album's worth of tracks. They had a minor hit with "You're the Apple of My Eye" in 1956, which earned them their first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show. After two years of no further success, DeVito fired his brother and Majewski for insubordination (they had refused to take a gig opening for Tony Bennett) and creative differences, as Majewski's comic persona did not mesh with the group's musical talents. The Four Lovers continued, with Valli, DeVito, and an ad hoc lineup that variously included Macioci (by then also pursuing a solo career as "Nickie Massey"), Charles Calello and Hollywood Playboys keyboardist Hugh Garrity. In 1959, after being introduced at a gig in Baltimore by mutual friend Joe Pesci, Royal Teen Bob Gaudio became a member. By 1960, after several years of session work under numerous stage names, the lineup of Valli, DeVito, Gaudio, and a now-renamed Nick Massi took on the name "The 4 Seasons", taking the name from a bowling alley in Union, New Jersey that had rejected them after an audition.
In 1962, Valli and Gaudio shook hands on a side deal. As Gaudio told Time years later, "'We said, 'Neither one of us knows where we're going to wind up, but maybe we should hedge our bets. You get 50% of me, and I get 50% of you.'" The partners eventually "divided well over $50 million on the strength of their original handshake."
As the lead singer of the Four Seasons, Valli had a string of hits, beginning with the number-one hit "Sherry" in 1962 and continuing through most of the rest of the decade.
During the 1960s, Gaudio and his songwriting partner Bob Crewe worked with Valli to craft solo recordings, the most successful of which was "Can't Take My Eyes Off You." It was rare at the time for major recording artists to perform solo while still recording with their own group. Valli's debut solo album was a collection of single releases and a few new recordings. He used the opportunity to transition away from the power falsetto that had made Valli and the Four Seasons famous, singing in a natural tenor voice. (Calello noted in 2000 that Valli's voice could go down to a baritone and that Valli would take on the baritone parts in harmony arrangements when he did not sing lead.)
"You're Ready Now" reached number 11 on the UK Singles Chart in December 1970, and "The Night" reached number seven on the UK Singles Chart in 1975. The same year, his single "My Eyes Adored You" hit number one on the Billboard Hot 100 and reached number five in the UK chart. This caused an awkward situation within the band, as Valli's label at the time, Private Stock Records, was willing to sign Valli, but not the band. Warner Bros. Records was willing to sign the band, but greatly preferred if someone other than Valli sang lead vocals. As part of that agreement, Valli—with great reluctance—ceded some of the lead vocals for the group to new band members Gerry Polci and to a lesser extent Don Ciccone. In the same year, he also had a number-six Billboard hit with the disco-laden "Swearin' to God" reaching number 31 in the UK chart, while further UK chart success came with "Fallen Angel", written by Guy Fletcher and Doug Flett. Valli was in the UK charts, reaching number 11. Meanwhile, the Four Seasons had a string of hits from their new LP Who Loves You in 1975; the title track with Valli, "December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night)" with Valli, Polci, and Ciccone, and minor hits "Silver Star" and "Down the Hall" (the latter from the follow-up album Helicon) with Polci alone. In 1976, Valli covered the Beatles song "A Day in the Life" for the ephemeral musical documentary All This and World War II, to which the Seasons also contributed a cover of "We Can Work It Out."