Singer and actor Alvin Stardust, who grew up in Mansfield, died aged 72 after a short illness, his manager said yesterday.

He had recently been diagnosed with metastatic prostate cancer and died at home with his wife and family around him.

The singer – real name Bernard Jewry – started out in the music business in the 1960s but became a huge star on the back of the 1970s glam rock craze scoring hits with tracks including My Coo Ca Choo and Jealous Mind.

Stardust, who lived in Billingshurst, Sussex, was still performing until recently and working on a new album due for release next month.

His manager Andy Davies said: “Alvin and I had only started working together over the last couple of years because he and I believed that musically he still had a great deal to give and explore, and so we recorded an album that is a testament to an artist who gave his career to music.”

Born in London, Stardust grew up in Mansfield and started playing guitar as a schoolboy. He met one of his biggest influences, Buddy Holly, at a gig in Doncaster and played backstage with the singer and his band the Crickets.

He signed his first record deal in 1961 as the frontman of Shane Fenton and the Fentones but the band struggled to get in the charts despite regular touring in Europe and the UK. In 1973, he signed up with Magnet Records and took on the name that would make him famous – scoring hit after hit as Alvin Stardust.

His success continued into the 1980s with Pretend and I Feel Like Buddy Holly making the top 10.

At the height of his fame in the mid-1970s, he appeared on TV as part of the Green Cross Code road safety campaign.

Turning to acting, he appeared in a string of musicals including playing the Child Catcher in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang at the London Palladium.