The Blue Diamonds (duo)


The Blue Diamonds were a Dutch 1960s rock and roll duo, best known for their million-selling chart-topping single, "Ramona". Indo brothers Ruud de Wolff and Riem de Wolff founded the group shortly after immigrating to Driebergen-Rijsenburg in the Netherlands in 1949. They were born in Batavia, Indonesia.

Early career

Called the 'Dutch Everly Brothers', The Blue Diamonds covered many Everly Brothers songs, but became famous in 1960 with their version of "Ramona", a song originally written for the 1928 film, Ramona. The song was written for promotional appearances with Dolores del Río but not featured in the film itself. The Blue Diamonds up-tempo version of it reached the American Billboard Hot 100 at number 72 in 1960. It sold over 250,000 copies in the Netherlands and over one million copies in Germany by 1961.

Later career

Although their last hit was in 1971, they continued to perform together up until Ruud de Wolff died from bladder cancer at the end of the year 2000. Riem de Wolff continued to perform and release albums until his death in 2017. At the time of his death, Riem had just been diagnosed with lung and liver cancer and had been suffering from the effects of a recent stroke.