IN THIS ISSUE: An in-person interview with LETTERS TO THE EDITOR LYNN ROBERTS about HAGEN WILLIAMS, HELEN FORREST, BOBBY Sidelights about BYRNE, JOHNNY JACK PURVIS, BOB CROSBY, DESMOND & OTHERS THE DORSEYS, & CHICK WEBB Reviews of BIG BOOKS AND RECORDS to consider BAND A NICKNAME PHRASE TRIVIA QUIZ JUMP E S S S S S S ® NEWSLETTER BIG BAND JUMP NEWSLETTER FIRST-CLASS MAIL Box 52252 U S. POSTAGE Atlanta, GA 30355 PAID Atlanta, GA Permit No. 2022 ¿5 BIG 1SA\D JUMP N EWSLETTER VOLUME LXIV________________________________BIG BAND JUMP NEWSLETTER________________ SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 1999 LYNN ROBERTS INTERVIEW The Background Lynn Roberts has been entertaining audiences with her vocal talents since 1937, two years after her birth, and she’s dedicated to continuing as long as she’s able. She’s been seen on PBS in specials with the current Tommy Dorsey orchestra led by Buddy Morrow, and is busy with personal appearances throughout the nation, so strong is the demand for her talents. She was, as she suggests in the interview, on the outside cusp of the Big Band Era, having worked for Charlie Spivak at age 15, then for Tommy Dorsey and Harry James. She is, by virtue of her experience, one of the finest Big Band singers still working today, continuing the tradition of girl vocalists who came before. We should mention one other fact: Lynn Roberts is a genuinely nice person, paying personal attention to everyone, without excep­ tion. On the bandstand she’s totally in charge, combin­ ing professionalism with her effusive personality to create the ultimate vocal entertainment. Lovely Lynn at work, with Michael Moore playing bass & Bucky Plzzarelli’s guitar The Scene in show business although my father was a frustrated During a break at a Big Band dance held in the social piano player. He loved music and he was good. He used hall of a church in Edgewater, Maryland, we set up the to play for me all the time at home. recorder in a church office. Lynn was stopped by fans several times on the way to the office to sign her CDs, BBJ: What happened between humming at sixteen but was finally able to courteously break away. The months and working for Spivak? first questions was the logical one, prompted by our knowledge of her early start in the business. LR: In between that time, I guess I was abouttwo, my father took me to some kiddie shows we used to BBJ: Did you want to sing ever since you can have around the New York City area, and I auditioned remember? and he played for me and I sang on Aunt Martha’s Kiddie Hour at the age of two. Then I became a regular on LR: Absolutely. The story goes that I was about another children’s program called the Horn and Hardart sixteen months old and I could hum a tune Children’s Hour, with Ed Herlihy who was the master of before I could talk, so I guess I really wanted it. ceremonies on that show. I was on that show for many years and that took me up to the age of twelve, and during BBJ: Is it genetic? that time, believe it or not, I was in vaudeville. I sort of got in on the tail-end of that, too. I played a lot of theaters LR: I don’t know. Nobody in my family was ever all over the country; in Atlantic City on the Steel Pier, the VOLUME LXIV BIG BAND JUMP NEWSLETTER SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 1999 Adams Theater in Newark, the Met in Providence, 1956, and Jimmy six months later. Rhode Island, the State in Hartford, Connecticut. .. it was the end of that era. I keep getting in on the end of BBJ: You were singing with them all that time? eras. LR: There was a year I left the band. Actually, I was BBJ: Who was with you all this time? fired. Tommy fired me because he got this thing about my pony-tail. I used to have this long blond pony­ LR: My dad, and of course my mother used to tail, it was sort of a trade mark, and he came to me one travel with me. I was a little kid, about seven, day and said, “I don’t like that pony-tail anymore. Cut eight, nine years old, so when I say that I’ve been in it off. ” I said, “I don’t want to cut my pony-tail off. ” He show business for fifty-five years people think I’m said, “Well, I think you should.” We compromised. I about ninety or something but I did start pretty young. told him I’d wear it up if he didn’t like it, and he said OK. I was married to the lead trumpet player, Flea Campbell, BBJ: Your first Big Band was Spivak? at the time. One night I came to work and Flea and I were celebrating our first wedding anniversary. I said to Flea, LR: I was fifteen. I had graduated from high school “You know, it’s our anniversary. I think I’m going to and I was doing a local New York afternoon wear my hair down with the pony-tail. ” Flea didn’t know television show, a kind of a talk show with music. Jerry whether I should do that, but I thought I would. I think Jerome had the band, and I was a guest on that show and I was being a little defiant. Irene Daye, who was Charlie Spivak’s wife, called the station and asked if I would be interested in auditioning I showed up at work that night, we were in Florida, and for her husband. He was looking for a girl singer. I said I was sitting on the bandstand. Tommy got on the sure and ran over to Nola Studios in New York and there bandstand and he looked at me; he didn’t say anything, were about fifty girls auditioning for Charlie and I sang he just walked up to the trumpet section and he said to my a couple of tunes and went home. That evening I got a husband, “Guess she doesn’t care what anybody says, phone call from Charlie’s manager and he asked me if huh?” Poor Flea said, “Well, you know, Tommy, it’s our I’d like to join the band. He said they were leaving anniversary and she just wanted to wear her hair down.” Thursday morning from the President Hotel, and there And he said, “You can tell her that from tomorrow night I was with my prom dress, the only gown I had, and I on she can wear it down for the rest of her life because started singing with Charlie Spivak and he was a darling she’s finished.” The next night I was gone. man. I love him. I stayed away for a year, and I guess about nine or ten BBJ: You must have been terribly bright to graduate months later I was doing a night club act working at the high school at fifteen. Chez Paree in Montreal and Tommy came into the club and asked me if I’d like to come back with the band and LR: I just wanted to get out! I wanted to sing! I told me that they were going to play the Paramount skipped a couple of grades and I started early. Theater with Sinatra that coming August and he wanted I don’t remember being particularly bright. I just really me to be with the band, and I couldn’t say no to that. To wanted to sing, that’s what I wanted to do as my work with Frank Smatra. Wow! mission. BBJ: Your last big name band was Harry James. BBJ: Tommy Dorsey. LR: Yeah, and I always wanted to sing with him, LR: That was a great learning experience. Actu­ and that didn’t happen until much later; it was ally, what happened was I joined Tommy in 1978 when I joined Harry. It was a lovely experience. He 1951 and then in 1953 Jimmy joined Tommy so I was a terrific guy and a great musician. actually spent two years with Tommy without Jimmy, and then Jimmy joined and that became the fabulous BBJ: Who manages you now.... you? Dorsey Brothers the second time until Tommy died in 2 VOLUME LXIV BIG BAND JUMP NEWSLETTER SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 1999 LR: (Laughs) Me! At my age I just do it. It’s nice. Hofstra University. I was actually invited to this confer­ My kids are all grown and married and OK and ence of people who had worked with him, for him; I can really just go and do whatever I want to do. I’ve writers, engineers.... Phil Ramone, Pat Williams.... just been doing a lot of wonderful dates with Doc Severinsen. tons of people, and Vic Damone did the evening tribute. We’ve been doing a lot of symphony dates where he uses He did all Frank’s arrangements. He’s just superb. He the Big Band within the symphony. The show is called just gets better. Big Band Hit Parade and he’s guest conductor at many symphonies across the country. That’s a lot of fun; he’s BBJ: Are you going to keep singing? wonderful, gosh, he’s great to work with. LR: I’m going to do this as long as I can, and I feel BBJ: What’s the future for Big Band music? blessed, you know, because it’s a gift, and there’s a responsibility when you haveagift to use it, and LR: There is a future, I think, and I’m seeing it.