Editing Frankie Lymon (section)

===1957–65: Solo career===
In early 1957, Lymon and the Teenagers broke up while on a tour in Europe. During an engagement at the [[London Palladium]], Goldner began pushing Lymon as a solo act, giving him solo spots in the show. Lymon began performing with backing from pre-recorded tapes. The group's last single, "[[Goody Goody]]" backed with "Creation of Love," initially retained the "Frankie Lymon & the Teenagers" credit, but they were actually solo recordings (with backing by session singers). Lymon had officially departed from the group by September 1957; an in-progress studio album called ''Frankie Lymon and the Teenagers at the London Palladium'' was instead issued as a Lymon solo release.

As a solo artist, Lymon was not nearly as successful as he had been with the Teenagers. Beginning with his second solo release, "My Girl", Lymon had moved to [[Roulette Records]]. On a July 19, 1957, episode of [[Alan Freed]]'s live [[American Broadcasting Company|ABC]] TV show ''[[The Big Beat (TV program)|The Big Beat]]'', Lymon began dancing with a white teenage girl while performing. His actions caused a scandal, particularly among Southern TV station owners, and ''The Big Beat'' was subsequently canceled.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/moondogs-final-sign-off-on-alan-reed-1421710119 |title=Moondog's Final Sign Off |date=January 20, 2021 |work=WSJ |access-date=February 4, 2021}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-17440514 |title=How the world's first rock concert ended in chaos |date=March 21, 2012 |work=BBC News |access-date=February 4, 2021}}</ref>

Lymon's slowly declining sales fell sharply in the early 1960s. His highest-charting solo hit was a cover of [[Bobby Day]]'s "[[Little Bitty Pretty One]]", which peaked at No. 58 on the Hot 100 pop chart in 1960 and which had been recorded in 1957. Addicted to [[heroin]] since the age of 15, Lymon fell further into his habit, and his performing career went into decline. According to Lymon in an interview with ''[[Ebony (magazine)|Ebony]]'' magazine in 1967, he was first introduced to heroin at age 15 by a woman twice his age.<ref>{{Cite magazine|last=Peters|first=Art|date=January 1967|title=Comeback of a Child Star|magazine=Ebony|volume=22|issue=3|pages=43|issn=0012-9011|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6iZkedjSfZoC&q=frankie+lymon+heroin&pg=PA42}}</ref> In 1961, Roulette, now run by [[Morris Levy]], ended their contract with Lymon and he entered a [[drug rehabilitation]] program. After losing Lymon, the Teenagers went through a string of replacement singers, the first of whom was Billy Lobrano. In 1960, Howard Kenny Bobo sang lead on "Tonight's the Night" with the Teenagers; later that year, Johnny Houston sang lead on two songs. The Teenagers, who had been moved by Morris Levy to End Records, were released from their contract in 1961. The Teenagers briefly reunited with Lymon in 1965, without success.