Rick Derringer, who has died aged 77, was a guitarist, singer and songwriter whose band the McCoys topped the US charts in 1965 with Hang on Sloopy; he went on to work with artists as diverse as Ringo Starr, Barbra Streisand, Cyndi Lauper, Steely Dan and Meat Loaf, while to wrestling fans he is best known as the composer of Real American, the entrance theme for Hulk Hogan which went on to be used by Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.

Richard Dean Zehringer was born in Celina, Ohio, on August 5 1947 and was brought up in nearby Fort Recovery; his mother was Janice, née Thornburg, while his father John was a section foreman on the railway line known as the Nickel Plate Road that ran across several states.