The last surviving member of the trio that turned “The Way You Look Tonight” into a hit has died.

Tony Butala, who co-founded the Grammy-nominated vocal group The Lettermen, died Sunday, Nov. 1, 2026, at 87, Tracy Clark, the group’s media coordinator, confirmed to The Associated Press.

Clark also shared an official statement from the band, which called Butala a founding member of an international recording act and a recipient of a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. “We have lost an integral member of The Lettermen family,” the band said.

“Tony never met a stranger,” the statement added. The band extended thoughts and prayers to his children, grandchildren, siblings, the love of his life and everyone in the Lettermen organization, describing his life as an example of talent, perseverance and refinement. His true joy, the band said, was entertaining and sharing his music with audiences worldwide.

A cause of death was not provided. There will be no public viewing, and the group is planning two celebrations of life, one in Wisconsin and one in California, with details to be announced later.

He Found Music on the Farm

Butala was born in Sharon, Pa., in 1938 and spent his early years on a farm with his grandparents, where he first found a passion for music. He began singing professionally at age seven.

At age eight he was on the air at KDKA Radio in Pittsburgh, and by age 10 he had moved with his mother to Los Angeles. He joined the Mitchell Boys Choir there and picked up film work, appearing as a child in “White Christmas,” “Peter Pan,” “War of the Worlds” and “On Moonlight Bay.”

Close Harmony Over Sheer Volume

Butala co-founded The Lettermen in the late 1950s with Jim Pike and Bob Engemann. The group’s version of Fred Astaire’s “The Way You Look Tonight,” released in 1961, became its first hit and climbed to No. 13 on Billboard’s Hot 100, built on close, careful harmony rather than volume.

The recording earned a Grammy nomination in 1962, and the group picked up a nomination for best new artist at the same ceremony. Over the following decade, 19 more of its songs reached the Billboard charts, including two Top 10s: 1962’s “When I Fall in Love” and the Grammy-nominated 1968 medley “Goin’ Out of My Head/Can’t Take My Eyes off You,” which folded two standards into a single sweeping arrangement. The last hit came in 1971 with “Everything Is Good About You.”

Butala and the group collected four Grammy Award nominations in all, and the band placed 20 hits on the Billboard Hot 100. His recordings also include “Come Back Silly Girl,” “Theme from a Summer Place” and “Hurt So Bad.”

The Trio That Kept Replacing Itself

The Lettermen toured relentlessly, playing college campuses across the country and venues around the world, and that road schedule is credited with keeping the name alive after the hits stopped. Butala stayed with the group for more than 60 years.

Members came and went across the decades, and the band answered each departure with a replacement, always remaining a trio to preserve its three-part sound. The current lineup is Donovan Tea, Bobby Poynton and Rob Gulack.

Engemann died in 2013, and Pike died in 2019 at 82 of complications of Parkinson’s disease, leaving Butala the last surviving member of the original three. Butala stepped away from performing in 2019. He and The Lettermen received their star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2020, and he posed atop it after the ceremony in Los Angeles on Feb. 24, 2020.

Words From His Final Solo

The Lettermen also posted a longer tribute online. “Though his performing days had come to an end, he was instrumental in laying the groundwork for The Lettermen’s legacy to continue under skilled leadership. The Lettermen of the present and future will always stand on the principles that guided Tony in its inception.”

The tribute closes with the words of Butala’s final public solo, as quoted by the group: “Smile though your heart is aching, Smile even though it’s breaking, When there are clouds in the sky, you’ll get by … If you smile through your fear and sorrow, smile and maybe tomorrow you’ll see the sun come shining through — if you just smile.”