My name is Monk Rowe and we are filming for
the Hamilton College Jazz Archive in Los Angeles. I'm very pleased to have Frank Strazzeri for
my guest today, and we've had some nice conversations on the phone. We have a few things in common, like where
we grew up, Upstate New York - some good musicians came out of there. FS: Yes. There was a piano player that - well first,
before anything, my uncle on my father's side, one of his younger brothers, his name was
Joe, and he was a jazz pianist, and a very good one, a very good one. So I was brought up listening to him as a
little kid, like five or six years old. I used to beg him, he used to live upstairs
from my grandfather, and every Sunday the family - what I mean by the family I mean
my grandfather's sons and his daughters and so forth - we'd all converge on the house
on Sundays and have dinner there, a whole bunch of us. Of course we were little kids, five years
old, so there must have been a good 20, 25 of us there every Sunday. And my uncle used to live upstairs. He was married, and my grandpa had an apartment
upstairs above the house, so Joe would come downstairs and join us, and I'd beg my Uncle
Joe, I says, "Come on Uncle Joe, play the piano for me." Never in my mind at that time had I ever even
thought of playing the piano. If I had thought of it, which I didn't, I
would have wanted to play a horn, which I did later start that way. Anyway I grew up listening to my Uncle Joe
playing swing style piano, like Teddy Wilson, Art Tatum, Mel Powell kind of a bag. MR: Can you recall any of the tunes he played
that might have stuck in your ear? FS: Oh he used to play "Avalon" and "After
You've Gone," and "Indiana," and "Idaho." Well you know, of course everybody's forever
playing "Body and Soul" and "How High the Moon" and those kind of things. They used to play things out of Benny Goodman,
kind of thing. Whatever we heard of Benny Goodman, he was
a disciple of that era. So I grew up as a little kid listening to
him play. He used to play in the house. He was a good solo piano player. He played real good by himself. MR: Did you ever get to go out and hear him
in a jazz environment? FS: Yes I did. Oh I used to hear him a lot because he opened
up a club in Rochester at that time, and the club in Rochester was the going place. It was named Squeezer's Bar. And my uncle, as it evolved from the local
musicians playing there, he eventually got to booking people out of New York City. So in turn I got to hear all the musicians
play out of New York City. But the strange thing about it, he would tell
the waitresses that worked in the club and the bartenders never to tell anyone that he
played. No one ever knew he played. It was like a - everyone knew it but the people
that were playing there. Teddy Wilson used to play there, and Teddy
Wilson used to come, George Wallington, people like that used to be there. Hank Jones. And none of them knew that he was a piano
player. MR: Was he afraid they were going to ask him
to sit in or something and he would not feel- FS: He just felt he wasn't on that level,
but he was, he really was. He was by my feelings, from things I've heard
and listened to. Because I used to hear him play. He was a very good piano player, he really
was. He had a great natural talent. But he was backward when it concerned like
furthering himself as a piano player. I mean I have reservations about things in
the past, thinking about it I will often tell myself gee you know, if he had only - would
have not listened to outside people, like maybe people in the family, they didn't want
him to play music for a living. He could have very well went to New York City
and became a real good jazz piano player because he was really good. MR: You first took up the saxophone? FS: Yeah. I played clarinet and alto saxophone, which
I play today, I play alto saxophone now. But how that ever happened was I was more
involved as a kid with sports, like a lot of kids. I was always running around playing football
and baseball. And lo and behold I got rheumatic fever, and
I had like a heart murmur. So the doctor told my family it was dangerous
for him to be running around like that. So is there anything that he likes to do that
you could keep him at home. Because I was an energetic kid like all boys,
running around like crazy. So I talked my - they wanted me to take lessons,
music lessons. They said well he likes music. So I was thrilled. Because at that time people in the family
didn't have that much money. So even as a youngster I wouldn't even think
of saying like buy me a clarinet. But anyway it got to the point that I got
a clarinet to study with this particular person, but it was given to me, part of the lessons. In other words if you take lessons they would
loan you a clarinet. And this is how I began playing the clarinet. And the saxophone I borrowed from a family
member. And as little kid, I don't know, I must have
been about nine, ten years old, I started playing that. Then as I was playing that, again they got
afraid that I was exerting myself too much, blowing the horn, believe it or not. So one day I came home and there was a piano
there. MR: It's funny, nowadays probably the doctors
would say that that's probably good for you, you know just that exercise. FS: You're right, isn't that funny? That is a difference. And then they arranged piano lessons. And I never envisioned playing the piano. I remember as a kid watching my uncle playing
- his fingers. I says ooh, this looks too hard. I just thought it was like impossible to do. And lo and behold I became a piano player. But because of the little story I told you,
it was a matter of keeping me home and keeping me really sedated in a way. Don't let this kid run around too much because
he's got a bad heart. MR: Do you think you surprised your family
members when a number of years later all of a sudden you're making a career at it? FS: Yeah I may have. My brothers, both of them are doctors. And that kind of a thing. You expect your other son to follow that kind
of a thing. And it may have happened that way, if I hadn't
gotten rheumatic fever and they forced me to stay at home. And by that of course like I said I started
playing an instrument, mainly to keep me at home, so I wouldn't run around. I mean it was as simple as that. But I wanted it. And like I told you, I really wanted it bad,
but I wouldn't tell my father to get me a clarinet or get me a saxophone. And just because of that they ended up getting
me a piano, and they felt that that was the easiest thing to do to keep me at home. And that's how I became a piano player. And like you said, what did - you just said? MR: Nowadays it might be a different thing. FS: I got away from what you told me, what
did they think of how I turned out, professionally. Well that - my father used to say, he was
a great guy - but he used to tell me, why do you play all that funny kind of music. And I'd play the piano, and he'd say, "Why
don't you play like Frankie Carle, where I could hear the melody, why do you play - all
this noise. He says you're playing all this, I don't know
what the heck you're playing." And of course us people, we like jazz, jazz
is not for everyone. You know that and I know that. What is it? MR: It's a pretty specialized kind of music. FS: It's a specialized kind of a thing. I think we all have to admit that jazz isn't
a front runner as far as public knowledge. Everybody doesn't know about jazz music, because
like what you said, it's a very select kind of a thing. But anyway I thought that was a funny thing. But anyway little by little I used to start
to make a living at doing it, and I played a little around Rochester, New York in those
days. But back what I came from, in that time, it
wasn't really the thing to do, playing music for a living in a small town like that. I mean because everybody was working at Kodak
Park or going to college and becoming a doctor or this or that. And here's a guy, my brothers are studying
to be doctors and here I am playing in a strip joint, playing piano in a strip joint, wondering
where my next paycheck would be coming from. And I had gotten there young, and of course
my family, my mother and father were very much against it. MR: Hey, what's going on here, how are you
going to feed your children? FS: What are you doing, you're wasting your
life away playing this bumpeta-bump kind of music and nobody likes what you're doing,
there's no future in this kind of thing. And by that happening I eventually joined
the Air Force, because during the Korean War at that time I either had to go in the Army
or what have you, be drafted. So I joined the Air Force. And as soon as I got in the Air Force I became
a piano player. But that was my break. Because they used me as a piano player in
the service. And that's when I began to really start playing
and learning things. And when I got out of the service I went back
to Rochester and again I was stuck with that same kind of way of making a living. Playing strips and whatever little jazz was
on weekends and so forth, it certainly wasn't enough to make a living. So I eventually moved, and ended up in Las
Vegas and working with Charlie Ventura there and Woody Herman. And then Woody Herman told me one time when
I was working with him and we got to talking one night and he says, "Well Frank, what do
you want to be?" I said, "Well I want to be a jazz piano player,
really." He says, "Well what are you living here in
Las Vegas for, Frank" he says, "get out of here. Go to New York or go to California, and if
that doesn't work out, just quit and go home, that's it. If you want to be a jazz piano player, you
can't be a jazz piano player playing around Las Vegas, there's nothing but shows here"
and this kind of thing. Even though he was performing there, but nevertheless
he's performing there because he's a commercial success. You know in jazz, Count Basie was there, Harry
James, but as you know they were huge names then and today. So he gave me the best advice that I ever
got really. He told me get out of there. If you're going to play jazz, go to New York. And I did go to New York for a spell, and
I just wasn't able to cope with that kind of living. It just didn't - because I had a wife and
a little kid, and I started going around looking for an apartment in New York and as you know,
New York, if you haven't got the money to spend five hundred dollars in those days and
have an apartment which would have been nice, which I couldn't afford, so I could only afford
what, funky looking places. And the environment just wasn't conducive
to bringing up a family. So I came out here. MR: Let me ask you about working with Al Hirt. FS: Yeah. MR: You went to New Orleans from Rochester? FS: Yeah I lived there for a while. MR: How did you land a gig with Al? FS: Well I used to play with Al Hirt before
Al Hirt was Al Hirt, before we all knew of him as being a famous trumpet player. We used to play local gigs. I remember playing with Al, I used to play
high school dances with him. We used to play like just regular weekend
gigs, I used to play with him. And lo and behold all of a sudden he becomes
a famous, real famous guy. Isn't that something? MR: There seemed to be a whole style of instrumental
music that did well in the 50s and early 60s, like Al and everybody from Ray Conniff and
all that kind of instrumental music that, you don't see that much nowadays. FS: No you don't, you're right. It seems like out of that particular thing
you're speaking of, it seems like the only one that's left in that idiom is sort of a
Pete Fountain kind of a thing. You know he's still a front runner as far
as an instrumentalist out of that. There's a certain thing out of the musicians
that come out of New Orleans - Sam Butera, Al Hirt, Pete Fountain and those kind of people. They were great musicians but they sort of
played like a sort of a semi-jazz kind of a thing. They were instrumentalists but not to the
point of like a heavy jazz kind of a thing, like Art Tatum or Bud Powell or Gil Evans
or something. MR: It's got a jazz tinge to it but it's very
listenable. FS: It's more listenable and more high flying
horn playing. I thought Al Hirt was a marvelous trumpet
player, and Pete Fountain too. Those guys could really play great. But you know who Al Hirt used to talk to me
about? He used to tell me how much he loved Clifford
Brown in those days. MR: No kidding? FS: Yeah. And he turned out what you heard. But in his own words to me in those days is
how much he liked to play tunes that Clifford Brown played. He used to play "Joy Spring" and those kind
of things, that we were all familiar with, Clifford Brown. Al Hirt used to play those on gigs with me. MR: Wow. And he went from that to "Java." FS: Yeah. But his favorite trumpet player, at least
that was the impression he gave me, were Clifford Brown and Dizzy and those kind of guys. So he was a true trumpet player. It was just, that was his bag of playing. MR: Was your wife into this music you did
too? FS: Yes. My wife actually has been with me from the
beginning. We were young kids together. We've been married 45 years. We were high school kids together. In fact I knew her indirectly, not directly,
but I used to see her when I used to go to grammar school. She used to live up the street from my father's
barber shop, where, that's how I used to go to this particular school. I used to go with my dad to the shop in the
morning, and I'd go to school, which was in a little different neighborhood than where
I lived. I didn't go to school where I lived. I went to school where my father had his shop. And she lived in that neighborhood. And I used to see this little skinny girl
going to school all the time, and a few years after we got out of grammar school of all
things, I go to the school and we meet at this school and all of a sudden the whole
thing comes around, and I said so you're the girl that was at such-and-such. A small world. And then we got married right out of high
school. And she's been with me through New Orleans
and New York and here and Vegas. And she's got a - I'm not saying this because
she's my wife, but I would have to say any woman with any musician over that period of
time is going to acquire something. And not because of my playing - part of my
playing - but a lot of it she sang. She used to sing. She used to be a good singer in the choir
in school, and then we ended up doing an album. She did a double with me. We went to Spain and did an album, and then
lo and behold she got something wrong with her voice and she can't sing no more. But we got as far as doing an album. MR: Well it helps to have a supportive spouse
over the years. FS: Oh yeah, you hit it right on the head. She has always been extremely supportive of
me. And how in the world else are you going to
make it in music being married 45 years? I mean I would have to say so many marriages
probably break down under a musician's kind of life, simply because of the negative kind
of thing that goes on in his life. One day he's working, one day he's not working
and eventually that kind of stress is going to blow out a lot of marriages. It's got to blow out a lot of marriages. But since she - I think a lot of it, since
she was with me at the beginning, you know we didn't get together as my career was going
okay. We started right together through strips and
all this kind of thing, so she knew what the ball game was all about. So when we went through hard times I'd have
to say she was a trooper. She knew what was going on. So she wouldn't just break up a marriage because
the old man wasn't making enough bread or that kind of thing. MR: So New York - a little too funky. So let's try the other coast, huh? FS: Yeah. You know I went to New York first - I went
there two or three times. One time I went there I was staying with Sal
Nestico. I'm sure you're familiar with Sal. He was a marvelous saxophone player and he
was a very dear friend of mine. He really was. I had a special thing for Sal. I went to his pad and I lived there. One night I went into the kitchen and turned
the lights on and all the walls were infested with cockroaches. I couldn't get over that. I had never seen anything like that. And that's why I never moved to New York. That was it. When I saw that, I says this is the only kind
of thing I can afford to live in and I've got to bring my wife and kids here for this? No way. That was primarily the real reason why I'm
here today. I couldn't handle that. I just couldn't handle it. My career was important, but man not that
important. I mean how do you say it, to each his own. You know, those that want to live that way,
fine. I really don't. I mean I can't say that every apartment was
like that, I don't know, maybe it was Sal, I don't really know. But I was told from other sources and other
people have said no it's, the city is infested with that kind of thing, even in groovy apartments
that's happening. All I could think of was my wife and kids
living there and that kind of thing and I said no way man. So I went back to Rochester and we packed
and we split and we came out west and I moved to Las Vegas. That's how I got here today. MR: Did you have any connections before you
got here? FS: No. I had one connection, Vince Gualardi. Vince Gualardi, I took his place with Woody
Herman. He told me he said, "If you come to L.A.,
Frank," he says, "you call me. Let me know." So I did that. And at the time he was working at The Lighthouse
with Frank Rosolino and Conte and Bob Cooper and Bud Shank, and I'm trying to think of
all the guys. Stan Levy was there in those days and anyway,
Art Pepper. So one day when I came to L.A. I found this
place to live, a home, a nice place. And after I paid the rent and paid everything
off and I moved the furniture and everything from Las Vegas here, I was primarily broke. I was figuring man what am I going to do now? Because I'll probably have to think of calling
my father and tapping him for something, which I didn't want to do because that meant that
I wasn't doing good. But I was going around to music stores and
giving a couple of lessons and something like that, but it didn't look good. But lo and behold I get a phone call. Now this is what happened when I first got
here. This was all going on about the first month
or so, first two months I was here. And I didn't know anyone and I didn't know
what I was going to do. But anyway I left my name with the union,
because I joined the union, you know my name was there. And I did mention to Vince that I was planning
to move here. He needed a sub, and somehow or another he
called the union and he says, "Has a Frank Strazzeri checked in?" Would you believe this? This really happened. And no one knew me. So he says, "Yeah, this guy's here." So Howard Rumsey calls me to work The Lighthouse
on a Sunday afternoon which entailed the whole day. Sunday you start about two o'clock and you
go on until like two in the morning. MR: Wow. FS: Yeah, in those days that's what we used
to do, it was The Lighthouse All-Stars, that's the way we worked. So I got the gig. I got the gig. I played out there Sunday and all of a sudden
I was working there with The Lighthouse All-Stars, I was working with Terry Gibbs and Herb Ellis
and then it just boomeranged and Red Mitchell and Harold Land and I started playing with
everybody. But it was primarily because of Vince remembering
that I had mentioned that I was thinking of coming here. And I owe that to him, that - I wanted to
play, now wait a minute, no but he was a groovy guy. Vince Gualardi was a good guy. MR: Yeah. He wrote some good tunes too. FS: Woah. You talk about a success story. But success is a strange thing. I mean can you imagine how successful he would
have been today? He died very young. He died about 47 years old. He died in a hotel outside the airport in
San Francisco. He checked in there because he was so busy,
he lived in the San Francisco area but he was too busy to go home, so he just checked
into a hotel, and they found him, he'd had a heart attack that night. He passed away. MR: He had a distinctive style to his tunes
too, I've even noticed some similarity between like "Cast Your Fate to the Wind" and the
thing he did for Charlie Brown. FS: Right. MR: They've got these harmonies in them, tenths
and all that stuff. It had a very distinctive, nice sound to it. FS: Well he had a flair for success. I mean for what people would like. I mean Vince's thing is to materialize into
a total success story because how does a jazz piano player move into the idiom that he did,
which would have been as big as anyone today as far as writing songs, because his songs
really hit. Talking about a guy playing jazz piano, he
met a guy in San Francisco that produced those shows. I would have to say the guy was like a jazz
lover of sorts. I can't recollect the producer of those shows
what you're speaking of, that Vince wrote the music for. But the guy went to Vince and says would you
write the music for this kind of thing? And the rest is history. Vince just happened to run into the guy. Because I don't think Vince had a reputation
for writing that kind of music. You know, I don't think he really had a reputation
for that. I think he just acquired a friend and the
guy had faith in him, and they both went on to fame. MR: So let me ask you if you think that there
is a style of west coast jazz, because you read in jazz history and I mean they mentioned
the west coast style and cool jazz. Is there something for you that makes west
coast jazz different than anything else? FS: Certainly not today. Certainly not today. I think you're talking about, in the 50s I
think. MR: Yes. FS: You're talking about a lot of the guys
that I worked with. I wonder about that. I don't know if I'm really qualified to - but
I do understand what you're talking about is -
there was a west coast kind of sound but I wonder if it wasn't the arrangers that wrote
that style more or less. Because if you think about it you remember
the Chet Baker quartet things that he did with Russ Freeman? That wasn't like a west coast feel at all. I don't think so. But the writing, I think a lot of that writing,
when they merged groups like say Art Pepper on alto and Stu Williamson on trumpet and
Bill Perkins on tenor and Frank Rosolino on trombone, and Marty Paich on piano and so
forth, and they'd put a group together, even Hampton Hawes was part of some of those things. And did you know Hampton Hawes did not play
a style that was conducive to the writing of Shorty Rogers kind of thing. MR: It wasn't laid back at all. FS: No. So I personally think, since you asked, I
think a lot of that west coast formula that you're talking about, a lot of that came from
the writers. I think they promoted that feeling more than
the soloists. It was just a writing thing, from what I can
remember. Because I played with all these guys and strictly
in a quartet vein, I played with Bud Shank or played with Frank Rosolino or Conte or
Bill Perkins or even Stu Williamson - I'm thinking of all these guys man. I don't want to leave anybody out because
there are so many of them, Art Pepper and Chet Baker. They certainly didn't play a west coast kind
of a feel when they played their horn, they really didn't. I can remember playing things with Stan Levy
and Frank Rosolino and those guys and man, that was not west coast. MR: It was burning huh? FS: It was burning, as much as when I was
working with Kenny Dorham. It was, like I said, a lot of what people
back east think of that west coast sound, I think it was created by arrangers that wrote
- Marty Paich - it's not west coast in a way, it's because of the way they wrote in that
particular day. And it could have been out of New York and
it could have been that guy writing out of New York what was his name, Ogerman? MR: Claus? Yeah, I know who you mean, the crossover. FS: The good arranger I mean. You've got to remember he came on 30 years
after these guys. You know talk about Jack Montrose writing,
Marty Paich, and people like that and Shorty Rodgers. I think they created what we call the west
coast sound. But that was sort of in the arrangers' hands,
that feeling, but certainly the soloists were not influenced by that feeling. MR: I'm interested to see that you played
with a good friend of Hamilton College, who is Joe Williams. I wondered how that came about and how you
enjoyed your stint with him. FS: Oh it was great. I worked with Sweets Edison, he had a group
behind Joe Williams. We worked out here in different places. I took Tommy Flanagan's place on that particular
job. And I liked it a lot. He was a great singer and a great guy too. I had a lot of fun on that band. That band had - Sweets Edison was the leader,
a funny guy man. And the tenor player that wrote "Night Train." MR: Jimmy Forrest? FS: Jimmy Forrest was playing tenor. And Tommy Potter was on bass, and Clarence
Johnson. I remember that band myself. Why I remember it and why I'm making a bigger
thing out of it is because when I left the group they went, their next job, from out
here, I forgot, we were in San Francisco or somewhere and I left and I came back here. And where did they go? They played their next gig in Rochester, New
York. I've never played in my own home town. MR: Oh dear. FS: I've never played in my own home town. I doubt that there's five or six musicians
that even know that I'm from Rochester, New York. I don't know anyone from there. I went home a couple of times and I went to
hear young fellows play, and I didn't know a soul. A stranger in your own hometown. I don't know anybody in my own home town,
because everybody's gone. The only one I see from Rochester is once
in a while I see Joe Romano, who I grew up with, we were kids together. And he lives in Las Vegas now. He used to live here and he lives in Las Vegas. And I see him once in a while so he tells
me what's going on, or he says nothing's going on. MR: Well listen, when was the first time that
you got to actually record, that you thought this is a significant event for me, this recording
out here? The first time you got to play with someone
on a record. FS: Oh, the first one I recorded with was
Terry Gibbs. And in a lifetime of playing you do a lot
of recordings, it's all part of the business you know. And I remember the first one as well as I
remember yesterday. I may have forgotten a whole bunch of them,
which I have, but you don't forget the first one. The first one was like, wow, it was really
a big thing. My first album was with Terry Gibbs. And I also remember who was on that, and I
can't remember hardly anyone that's on records. I can't even remember the name of the records
I do, even under my own name. I don't know what that's all about. You forget. We've got all these records, I can't remember
any of the people on them, but I remember that first one. The bass player used to be with Dizzy, Frank
Capp on drums, Herb Ellis was on guitar, Al McKibbon was on bass-
MR: Al McKibbon - but he's out here now. FS: Yeah. The second album I did was with Herb Ellis. And after that I draw a blank. I can't remember one thing from another. MR: Do you think you play as well on record
as you do in live situations? FS: Well that's hot and cold. That's a hot and cold subject. You can be great in the studio - a lot of
times it all depends on the piano you're playing on, at least with me. It could be the piano I'm playing on, it could
be the room I'm in, I like the sound of it, it could be I like the bass player or I don't
like this or I don't like that and I think that has a lot to do with my being hot and
cold. Just to get a more direct answer to what you
asked me, I find I like to record. I like to record because it's quiet and there's
no distractions, and I can concentrate. I don't have to perform for people, you know
what I mean? It's like a boxer. When he practices in a ring and he practices
and is working out, he certainly is not the same guy that when he gets in front of a huge
crowd, you know, like a championship fight. Them guys, their adrenaline gets up. Sometimes when your adrenaline gets up it
works against you. You get too dramatic, you get too energized. I find that kind of thing sometimes doesn't
work in my behalf. Sometimes I think conditions forcing you to
lay low sometimes get me in a better groove as far as playing. Strange question, but it's true, that does
arise. It's something to think about. MR: In 1969 you did something that seems a
little bit like a left turn, you were a music coordinator for the "Johnny Cash Show?" That's interesting. FS: Well years ago I got interested in country
music, out here. And in fact I got so interested into it that
I had a country band. I actually had a country band and actually
we worked some jobs. I got a bunch of these guys that were really
country guys and, looking back at it, that was a long time ago - it was a good 30 years
ago when at first that kind of thing happened. We used to rehearse in my home. I had all these country guys singing away
and we'd rehearse, and then we actually ended up getting gigs. But I didn't, I never had experience playing
country music. But I organized this group and I believed
in it. It just shows you the power of - I don't know
what would you call that - just thinking about something and wanting something
actually makes things like that happen. In this particular case it did. Now here's a guy that played jazz and all
of a sudden he's messing around with country music, and to the point that he actually organizes
a band and actually goes out and gets jobs playing country gigs, with really no credentials
you know. I didn't know many country songs, and I used
to write my own songs, and we used to play these things and these guys used to sing them,
it was unbelievable. Anyway I had some of these guys from back
east came and visit me one day at my house. The guys I'm talking about. These guys from back east. This guy Vic Kertch and Joe Romano, these
guys or J.R. Monterose, Sal Nestico, they're all sitting in my den. And now these guys are dead ring jazzers right? So they come to my house and they're sitting
there watching us play country music and they're looking at me like there's something wrong
with me. Anyway but that was a funny thing, to watch
their reaction to this whole thing. But what I was really leading to was that
all of a sudden I got a call from Shorty Rodgers and he was doing a thing for Screen Gems out
here. And he had something to do with the "Johnny
Cash Show" coming out of Nashville, Tennessee. Apparently they asked him for a musician that
he would recommend to send down there as being musical coordinator. By that I mean I used to oversee the dance
routines and the singing things, where they would stand, the words, and they would give
me the music that they would sing and I would go over it and give it to the arranger, I
think in this particular case it was an arranger, not arrangers. Anyway that's when I was down in Nashville
doing that. But before, I got a call, and Shorty says,
"Would you be interested in doing something?" I says, "Yeah." And here we're talking about, I never had
a country job in my life except what I promoted. No one knew this. And lo and behold don't I get a call to start
the ball rolling as far as actually getting this job. So this guy comes down from Nashville, Tennessee
and he interviews me at a hotel like this, sort of like this, he's interviewing me and
talking to me about it and I says yeah, I think I could do it. He says, "Okay, I sort of like it, let's do
it." So he gave me the job. And I go down to Nashville, Tennessee and
I got an office and here's a guy that never worked a job in country music in his life
and he's got an office and I'm the musical coordinator for the "Johnny Cash T.V. Show." Would you believe this? I mean I wanted to do it, I really wanted
to do it. But I think all I'm really trying to say is
positive thinking - if you stop to think about it, I had no credentials at all. And here I ended up with a stone hard country
job. I mean this was like, you're talking about
guys that had been doing this their entire lives. And here I am in there in the position of
overseeing things musically for that show. I mean he was phenomenal though. When I got there I realized like I was in
heavy water here man, I mean this was deep water. And anyway that's how that happened. MR: I wonder if people down in Nashville - there
was probably people who wanted that gig. And here's this Italian fellow coming in from
Los Angeles. FS: Right, right. You hit it right on the head. You hit it right on the head. And here I am in meetings with all the producers
and Johnny Cash and his wife sitting there, and I'm sitting in the room, I really felt
out of place. And eventually I think they saw that in me,
they knew that I was out of place. But I did the best I could with what I had. It was a great job. I just longed to be back here playing jazz. I really did. I made that move, like I told you, but after
I got into it, I told myself, this isn't something I want to do any longer. I think I filled the cup up as far as I could. I saw it for what it was. Because you know after all you're in another
man's life and when you do something like that you've got to believe in it. I believed in it up until the time that it
really had to change my life. When it really got to the point that, hey
man, you've either got to become country now, or you're going to be a jazz piano. But what are you going to be now? When I was living down there I was living
with country people, and I didn't know how to respond to them, because I'd lived my whole
life with what we're talking about, jazz people. And when I got into that, into the personality
kind of a thing, it was another ball game. MR: Yeah. You're not sure sometimes if people are making
jokes or if they're serious about things. FS: I didn't understand them, and neither
I think did he understand me. Although I ended up working with Elvis Presley. I worked with Elvis, I did a couple of tours
with him, and it's on that paper. MR: Yeah? What tunes were they? FS: I did a couple of tours with him. MR: You were on the Hawaii special? And the first live world satellite broadcast. FS: Yeah. MR: Wow. FS: Yeah, he was a groovy guy. He was a nice guy. Every time - he and I sort of hit it off. I mean he was such a big star, that just being
a musician playing with him, like myself coming in from the outside, you have to know the
situation other than his immediate guys that had worked with him for years and knew him
good. But a guy like me coming in adding on, didn't
know him at all and I'd just make the rehearsals without him. You play the music and the conductor and so
forth, and you play the music so you don't really get to know the guy until he goes on
stage and he sings and you just play the music that you rehearsed, right? So I still didn't know him. So one night he had a party at the hotel and
so I go to the party, I go with all the musicians and their friends or wives that were invited
to go. So we all go to this huge suite up atop, we
were in Oklahoma somewhere. And so all these people, of course it's a
huge star, they're all gravitating towards him, everybody wants to meet him and what
have you. So he's way on the far end of the room, and
I can always remember this - I don't know if this makes for interesting conversation-
MR: I want to hear it. FS: I really don't know, but we're talking
about a guy that very few jazz musicians would ever get to know. And I fortunately did get to know him, somewhat. As much as you're going to get to know a guy
like that. So anyway he's way in the other room and I
was with this trumpet player and we were like against the wall over here. Sort of feeling left out, both of us. I mean we're there, we're drinking, we don't
know anybody. We know a few musicians that are there, and
they're there with their wives and so he and I, we don't know anybody. And so we're just looking around. And he's meeting people. Every time he turns around "hello" and he's
meeting this person and then he meets this person and he goes over to another group of
people. There must have been 60, 70 people up in this
huge suite. So he looks at me from way over in the room,
I told this guy John, I can't remember his last name, his name was John, the trumpet
player, and I says, "Man, I think he's going to come over here, man." I said, "Let's get out of here," you know
I don't want to - Under the situation of working with Elvis Presley, all you get from all the
musicians and the people around, producers and everything, is that he's a huge star. He's a huge star. And you're being treated like a king. You're eating like steaks and flying with
his airplanes, but everything but meeting the guy. So he becomes a symbol of like success, big
success. You're talking about Frank Sinatra, that kind
of thing. So I says "John, let's get out of here." I said, "I think he's going to come over here
man," I said, "What are we going to say to him?" So lo and behold, he does come over. And I'm standing there, all of a sudden he's
got his hand around, and he's a big guy, and he's looking at me and I says oh man, what
am I going to say with this guy? So my wife had told me that he was into karate. I say, "Hey Elvis," I says, "I hear you're
into karate." He loved that. That was his bag. That was his groove. He says, "Oh really?" He says, "Let me show you some things man." He says, "You wait here, Frank." So he leaves and everybody's following him
to his bedroom, and there was about three bedrooms up there in this huge suite. So I go out on the veranda, we're on the top
floor of the hotel, and on the outside of things, like you're outside. You could walk around the hotel like a veranda,
I forgot what you would call that. But anyway, but I'm out there and all around
the outside of the hotel up on the top floor, and there were bartenders all over the place,
like mini bar set-ups. So I went out and had a drink you know. All of a sudden I hear everybody saying, "Hey
Frank, Frank, Elvis is looking for you." I said this has got to be putting me on. So anyway I come in and he's all dressed up
in a karate outfit. He spends the whole night talking to me about
karate. And little by little everybody split. Because he found his groove. He found someone that would listen to him
about his thing. And I think he took a liking to me. I know I did, I liked him, he was a groovy
guy. I thought he was a groovy guy. A real down home guy. He wasn't like a lot of stars that I worked
with. I worked with Les Brown, with Bob Hope, I
worked with a lot of stars, and you don't, you very seldom get in contact with them. But Elvis wasn't that kind of guy. And the next morning I look under my door,
and there's an envelope, and there was 300 bucks in there, just to talk to him. And another time I talked to him again, another
300. And another time I talked to him, another
300. Every time I talked to the guy he gave me
300, plus the way we lived, and we were getting good bread every single day, I was making
good money because we were doing one-nighters, and staying at the best hotels, and our own
plane, our own chefs, our own pilots, our own stewardesses, everything. It was unbelievable. It really was. It was like, for a musician, being on the
road, it was the best gig you could possibly get. I can't think of anything that could have
been any better than that. MR: That's a great story. FS: Plus he was a nice guy. He seemed like a real nice guy and it was
a very sad thing when he died. I felt sort of bad about that. MR: Were you on the band when, I'm not sure
if it was the Hawaii concert or, I guess it was in Las Vegas, where he actually sat at
the piano and played? FS: No. No. MR: I never knew he did that until I saw that. FS: That would have been Las Vegas I feel. I did tours with him twice. But the two biggest jobs were the recordings
that we did were "Live at Madison Square Garden" and what was it, Elvis in Honolulu? I forgot the title of that particular album
that we did but it was the first Telstar show that was ever filmed, that was ever beamed
down to- MR: Broadcast, yeah. FS: A broadcast. That was it. And then I never went with him again, that
was it. MR: So that was - what year? FS: I don't know, it's on that paper. I can't recollect when it was. I don't know, it was in the '70s wasn't it
somewhere? It would be interesting if you could tell
me. MR: Yeah it must have been in the 70s. Okay. After leaving Les Brown he was with Elvis. Probably early 70s. FS: Yeah. I would have to say it was around there. MR: Interesting. Well it's great to hear that you've had not
only the jazz thing but a little bit of country, and little bit of Elvis. You got any other curve balls to throw at
me here? FS: My first jazz job was in New Orleans,
playing with Sharkey Bonano. That was a Dixieland thing. That was sort of, I'll have to say different. I was looking, and I was a young kid and in
those days I used to look at those guys like they were ancient. Now I'm them today. And it's a strange thing on that particular
group that I played with, that band had a very famous guy on it, really. His name was Emile Christian. He was a trombone player. He was the first jazz trombone player on the
Original Dixieland Band. MR: Oh my. FS: The first Original band that came east
from New Orleans, they came and played in Chicago, and what was that, maybe it was around
the 1920s or so, when you first heard. He said the only music that they ever heard
back east in those days was three-quarter time. One-two-three, one-two-three. They never heard this jazz band, what they
call jazz band. And all the people in Chicago were lined up
for blocks to hear this new music. And Emile was one of the first guys that played
jazz that was seen and recognized in this country. He was 68 years old then, in those days, this
was 1950, 1952 around then. This is when I played with that group. There were all these old guys that originated,
part of the origination of -really originating of jazz in this country. MR: Yeah. They were the first recorded jazz band, the
Original Dixieland. FS: That's right. And Emile Christian was on that band. And in that group what we were playing, I
didn't know any of those Dixieland tunes, and I had to play everything by ear, and I
had Emile - he used to play the trombone parts - , he played the trombone parts and for me
to follow when Sharkey and them would play the melodies on these tunes. And I never heard Dixieland tunes. And the trombone player would spell out the
chord, try to spell out the chord on the trombone for me, and I'd play it on the piano. MR: That's great. FS: And then come to find out he was an extremely
famous guy. But he did tell me that he did come to Chicago
with that band. And years later I opened up an encyclopedia
of jazz and there he is with this old, old picture of the Original Dixieland Band, there's
Emile playing the trombone as a kid. Isn't that something? MR: Yeah. That's really interesting. FS: I thought that was a wild thing. MR: A little piece of history there. That's nice. You have quite a long list of recording credits. I have one piece here. Let's see if you recognize where this might
have come from. MR: Of course I cut out the whole rest of
the band, this is your piano solo. Well here you go. "Indian Summer" that is. FS: Are you sure this is from here? MR: Yeah, pretty sure. See you've made too many recordings. FS: Wait a minute. Who's that trombone player? Carl Fontana. It's the top now. Is this the thing that Conte did a feature
on trumpet? Conte's on here. Really? Oh I see. I didn't know. MR: Well I just always think it's fascinating
because you fellows who have been in the business for so long do so much recording that sometimes
it goes by and sometimes you don't even hear it back I would imagine. FS: Oh no, you're right. I just did a thing with Lenny Niehaus, and
the album is out and all the people have heard it and I don't even have the album. They didn't even send me the album. A lot of times they don't even send me albums. I don't even know what I've done. I have no idea. And I'm not trying to play that down, I'm
not trying to make another story out of it, but it's extremely true. I have to admit I forget a lot of things I've
done. In fact there was one time I heard a record
of a tune I wrote, and it was my arrangement, and it was these guys out of New York doing
it. Kenny Barron was on piano and I thought it
was me. And I said when did I do that thing? Because I had played the arrangement with
the guys out here, so I figured that must have been me. And it was Bobby Shew and some guys out of
New York that apparently he had taken the arrangement and did this tune I wrote, with
these guys from New York. But by that arrangement I thought in this
case I was on it. What a surprise to find out it was a whole
different band. MR: Oh my. And you played on Chet Baker? FS: Yeah. I played with him for years, Chet. About 30 years I played with him. I actually buried him when he died. I had a talk over his grave out here. They buried him out here. The family brought him out here and buried
him next to his father out here by the airport. And they asked me to say something over his
grave. I couldn't believe he was dead man. I had just left him in France man. We were at this chateau, this beautiful chateau,
we were out there in the country man, and I remember getting on the bus going to the
airport. They picked me up and took me to the airport,
I saw Chet in thongs and a white tee shirt, and, "See you Frank," you know that was the
way he talked, he seemed so meek and sick you know. The next thing I knew he was dead. And then they brought him here and they were
burying him here and they asked me to say something about him. You know the one thing I always thought about
Chet was they had a lot of things they always talked about him. Did you ever see the movie on his life? MR: No. FS: You ever saw the movie on his life? There was a biographical kind of a movie made
by Bruce Weber did it. I was on it, I played on it, and they let
me be part of picking the tunes and so forth, which the album with Chet here-
MR: "Let's Get Lost?" FS: Yeah. Okay. So there were so many things that had been
said about him and always going to this drug routine. Always the drugs. Even the movie that I was part - not a movie-
MR: A documentary. FS: A documentary on Chet. And throughout the whole documentary that's
all they talked about was drugs and his dealings with girls and all this garbage man. I mean the guy was a trumpet player man. To be very frank, I hope Bruce Weber never
hears this, but I fell asleep when I saw the documentary. It just went on, this endless B.S. man about
him and girls and dope. I mean I wanted to hear him play the trumpet. I mean that's why I went there to see the
movie - not because I was in it, I was part of the whole thing. But I wanted to see him play the trumpet or
sing or whatever. That's all they talked about was that. Okay. So when he died, when they buried him, I didn't
know what to say. The family asked me to say something. So I think I said something that was very
true, I believe it to be that way, I said he's probably the most honest guy to what
he wanted to be as a musician. I think he was the most honest, one of the
most honest jazz musicians that ever was. Because he lived a life and he never made
excuses for him being on dope or what have you. And all he did was play the trumpet, and that's
all he cared about. You've got to see this, it's all he cared
about. He didn't care about like mowing the lawn. He didn't care about paying insurance bills. He didn't care about painting houses. You see what I'm trying to say? He didn't do - for all the things that I myself
do in life, and have done, he never did that. All he did was play. That's all he cared about. He didn't care about anything but playing. In other words like in one instance he broke
up with his girlfriend in San Jose or something, in that area. Because she told me, he broke up with her
man, he just got his trumpet, with his thongs and a white tee shirt, that's all he had. No clothes, no nothing. And he thumbed to the airport and came here
and started that documentary movie. I mean how many guys would even think of doing
that. No family, no kids. I mean he had children but when his kids did
see him you know what they used to tell me? "Tell my father to send us some money. We're starving over here in Stillwater, Oklahoma." He just lived that life. Now I'm not saying that all jazz musicians
are supposed to live a life to the point that just excludes all the correct things that
we all have to do. But Chet didn't do anything like that. Chet lived for just to play, and that was
it man. He didn't care about beautiful clothes. He didn't care about any of that stuff. All he cared about was playing. That was it. Like if a chick got in his way, goodbye, and
that was it. He had a different formula let's say. But when they asked about, why are you always
taking dope and all that. You know what he would say? Because I like it, that's my groove. He didn't make any excuses like a lot of guys
that I have known in my past that were on junk. Because of society's pressure, they would
make excuses for it. This or that, or I didn't have any money,
I was broke, and I got high because it would make me feel better or something. What have you. Chet said I like it man. Why make excuses for it, I'm not a poor junkie,
I dig what I'm doing. And I used to see that and I used to say my
God, I mean he is honest about the thing. He never changes, he never made excuses for
going to jail for that. He didn't care. He just didn't care about having a wallet
with credit cards, or having a driver's license. He didn't care about any of that. I mean some people will say well man that's
not being honest. But as far as the way he wanted to live, he
was honest. He treated that whole scene honest man. He didn't hide that he was a doper, he didn't
hide that if a chick got in his way, goodbye. He lived in another world, and to me there
was a sense of honesty to him when it concerned what he did. I know a lot of people will say well man you're
nuts. I was around the guy a long time man. There are certain things about the way he
lived that if you put it in the correct vein there would be a lot less trouble in this
world. It's like in Switzerland and in Holland and
in places like that, the people that are addicted to drugs, they just let them do it man, until
they die. They don't put them in jail. They just say okay, you want to take drugs,
go to the park where they sell the drugs, they take the drugs, they go against the tree,
they lay there dead, they're all stoned out you know, and the officials, the cops just
say let them go man. And when they die, they just bury them that's
it. You know what they say? Good riddance. But even so, you look at the people that are
taking the dope, they just do it, and they gave up. This is their way of life. I mean who's to say what is right when you
give up your life man? And these guys give up their lives man. They're hooked. I've known a lot of people that were hooked,
they were strong enough or something within, it was a way of stopping it, and then there's
the cases like Chet Baker and Sal Nestico, they couldn't stop it. And they were honest about it. They didn't give a hoot what anyone thought
of them, they just would get high and that was it. It became part of their lives. Look at me man, I smoke cigarettes. Am I any better then them? I don't think so man. It's just the laws say smoking a cigarette,
Frank, is legal. But I'm going to die from it man. So what's wrong with them? As long as you don't hurt another party, I
figure part of that is being honest man. And Chet Baker I think was a very honest guy
about what he did. He never made excuses for what he was. He never did. And maybe I'm blabbing quite a bit about something
of this nature, and believe me I'm not one to uphold being addicted on drugs. But who am I to say what is wrong about anyone
when I can't even stop smoking cigarettes, which is just as bad as what they're doing? And I'm not saying I'm honest, but I'm within
the law. They know they're breaking the law and if
they get caught they have to go to jail. I would have to say they're more honest than
I. I'd have to say they're more honest about what they're doing than myself. MR: Well it must have been interesting to
try to accompany him in his singing. It was such a fragile approach he had. What to play behind that. FS: Playing behind him was like playing behind
- the easiest thing I've ever done was play behind him. He never questioned me, never. And that's another thing that was great about
him. He wasn't no picayune kind of a guy. He knew who he was. He knew he was important. I don't want to alleviate that, because he
told me some things that made me know, because he had a lot of battles with jazz promoters,
and basically he was saying like hey man, I'm somebody. You don't tell me what to do. If you want me, I tell you what to do. So some of that did rub off on me as far as
like learning about him. What were we speaking of again? MR: I'm just trying to envision what it was
like to play behind him. FS: He was very easy because he was a basic
jazz guy. He was very, very basic. What I liked, he liked. I think there's a certain element of jazzers
that are basic guys, like Frank Rosolino. I think Charlie Parker was basic. Basic qualities. They didn't have, they would take a tune and
say here man, here's the changes. This is what I want to hear. And I played with a lot of guys that are that
way. And there's nothing wrong with that either. It's just that I'm saying he was more of a
basic guy. He would leave it up to you to do it. Maybe he was a little on the lazy side, that
he wouldn't even have lead sheets good enough, something like that. But he would say, "Frank you know what? Yeah, let's do it." He wouldn't say what key, never. I'd start the tune off and when it was high
he'd sing falsetto, he could sing in any key. He wasn't like all the other singers, who
would say E flat, A flat. He never said the key, nothing. He would just do it. And if it's high, he'd sing high. That's the way he was. A very basic guy. He was very, very basic. A musician. He never asked that much of you. But if you didn't play good, out man. It was as simple as that. He was even honest that way. In his sort of way he was a very honest musician. You'd have to be playing a long time to know
what I say when I say honest. He wouldn't ask that much of you. But if you didn't play good man, I saw him
what he did to other people. He'd toss them out, right now man. He wouldn't even talk, he'd freeze them. He wouldn't even talk to them. I saw him freeze a lot of guys, he just wouldn't
talk to them. They would talk to him, he wouldn't answer
them. He'd just make them know that he wasn't interested
in them. MR: You're a fairly prolific tune writer too. You write most of your tunes at home? You sit down and see what happens? FS: Yeah, like I suppose everyone that writes
a tune does. It isn't difficult at all. Once in a while I'll come upon a tune that
I actually sit there and waste time with it for about three or four days. God there's a couple of tunes where I sat
on them. But I have to say as far as like tune writing,
I really think most guys that write tunes, because I don't want to speak of myself as
a tune writer per se like Hank Mancini or something like that. God I wish I was. But I think most people that write songs,
I think it becomes easy for them. I just can't envision - the songs I wrote,
whatever I wrote, whether it was good or bad, to me it was like nothing. It was like a very - I say it that way because
I ran across a lot of people who have sort of made a big thing about writing. And to me I can't picture Hoagy Carmichael
or those kind of people or Charlie Parker or any of those people, or Miles or whoever
wrote songs, it must have been easy for them. I know it wasn't hard for me. It was very easy to write a song. It seemed like just like that. So I picture, I'm no different. It must be something that comes along with
the territory. MR: Well listen I've really enjoyed your reminiscing. I really did. FS: It's my pleasure, believe me. Because you know we're talking about something
that is our lives. For you to, going through what I found out,
as much as you've done and went to the musicians in New York and coming here, that's a labor
of love. Definitely. So if you're happy about it, so am I. It's like me playing with like Chet, like
the way Chet was, he was all for jazz. His whole life was jazz man. And like I told you, nothing meant anything. In his case maybe it was overdone a little. But nonetheless, he was doing what maybe he
was born to do. And he was born to be that. It's like myself, whether I like it or not,
I became a piano player. I believe a lot of things are written on the
wall. Before you even get there, they're there. And they happen. Like that funny story about the country. How in the world could that ever emerge? How could that ever happen unless I believed
in it so much that something was written in for that to happen. It will never happen again. MR: All right. Well thank you very much. FS: My pleasure.
