[JPL] I Love The (Musicians In Their) 90s

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November 2, 2007

The Huffington Post


By Tony Sachs
I Love The (Musicians In Their) 90s
Posted November 1, 2007 | 08:12 AM (EST)

New York is the greatest city in the world. Anything you want can be yours,
as long as you have the money and the desire. And I had a little of one and
a lot of the other. I wanted to hear some of the biggest musical stars of
1948. In person. This weekend. Sure enough, a quick scan of the listings and
a couple of phone calls later, I'd lined it up. Three musical legends in
three nights, all of whose biggest hits were damn near six decades old, and
all of them over 90 years old. I broke out my snap-brim hat and got ready
for a weekend of steaks, martinis and cigarettes. It was time to party like
it's 1948.

As the big nights drew near, I got heavier into my vintage vibe. I stopped
worrying about Hillary and Giuliani and started concentrating on the
Truman/Dewey presidential election. I started calling people "Mack" and
"Ace" and "Dollface." I upped my red meat and gin intake considerably, which
left me wondering if all males in 1948 had such bloated, distended stomachs.
I wasn't allowed to replace my computer at work with a vintage Smith-Corona,
but I did try to take a few minutes out of each day to stare at my PC and
say "Astonishing... simply astonishing," as if I had time-traveled into the
space age.

I was ready.

NIGHT 1: TONY MARTIN (biggest 1948 hit: "It's Magic") at Feinstein's At The
Regency.

By '48, this big-voiced baritone belter of hits like "I Get Ideas" and
"There's No Tomorrow" had already been in the music biz for over a decade,
scoring his first hits when Frank Sinatra was still an unknown singing
waiter in New Jersey. The mere fact that he's still alive is pretty
incredible, but performing? Two months shy of his 95th birthday? This I had
to see.

Martin needed assistance getting to the stage, and for the first couple of
songs he searched in vain for the right key and tempo like a geezer grabbing
the mic at his granddaughter's wedding. But once he hit his stride, he just
kept getting better and better. For a solid hour, Tony Martin kept the crowd
in the palm of his hand. He stood for the whole show. He didn't blow a
single lyric. His voice wasn't what it was in 1948 -- it's more delicate
than overpowering now, and it takes a little bit longer to get to the high
notes -- but it hardly mattered. He sang maybe the best versions of "Begin
The Beguine" and "How Do You Keep The Music Playing" I've ever heard. And
every now and then, his throat would open up and out would come a big,
booming note that recalled the power he used to have, and which made the
many geriatrics in the audience sigh and squeal.

As good as the singing was, the between-song patter was even better. "This
is a song I did in a movie with Fred Astaire" -- in 1937. "I learned this
song from Russ Columbo, who was a very dear friend of mine. I knew his
father, too." Russ Columbo has been dead since 1934. I wouldn't have been
surprised if he'd said "Franz Schubert wrote this. We used to play pinochle
together." Or "I originally performed this song for Charlemagne. He was on
my team in Little League."

Given Martin's age, mere competence would have sufficed for most of the
audience. Instead, he gave us magic. If you're only going to see one
95-year-old crooner, make it Tony Martin. And if there's another one out
there, please let me know.

NIGHT 2: LES PAUL (biggest 1948 hit: "Lover") at Iridium.

Les Paul has had a Monday night residency at one club or another in New York
for at least the last 25 years, and has called Iridium his home for the last
decade or so. One of the most dazzling jazz guitarists of all time,
arthritis has robbed the 92-year old Paul of the dexterity in his fingers,
so while he still gets the same tone he had 60 years ago, he no longer has
the speed to go with it; he saved almost all of his solos for the ballads.

Still, getting to hang out with the Thomas Edison of pop music for an hour
and a half is far from a ripoff. After all, the man pretty much designed the
electric guitar as we know it, and was the first major recording artist to
use multi-track recording and pitch alteration. How ironic that one of the
most talented musicians of the last century has made it possible for
supremely untalented performers to make good records. I wonder if he blames
himself for Britney Spears.

Not that he talked about that sort of thing during his chatty, relaxed,
informal set. He kibitzed with the other members of the band, indulged in
some lewd repartee with his comely female bassist (the sort of which I think
you have to be born before 1930 to get away with), joked with the crowd,
invited amateurs up from the audience to jam with him, and generally had a
fine old time. So years from now, when my 89th birthday is but a receding
memory, I can say to my grandchildren, "Yep, I saw Les Paul. And I paid $12
for a martini to boot. We thought that was a fortune back then." And it
seems almost inconceivable that a 160-year-old Les Paul won't still be
playing somewhere and holding court every Monday night.

NIGHT 3: IRVING FIELDS (biggest 1948 hit: "The Wedding Song") at Nino's
Tuscany.

Irving Fields is probably the most legendary figure in music history to ever
play piano in an Italian restaurant six days a week in his 93rd year on
earth. Little did the calamari-munching patrons of Nino's Tuscany, a lovely,
unassuming joint in the West 50s, know their background music was being
supplied by a man who'd written hit songs covered by everyone from Dinah
Shore to Frank Sinatra to Xavier Cugat. A man who, in 1947, wrote "Managua,
Nicaragua," a song so popular it was taken to #1 on the charts by Freddy
Martin AND Guy Lombardo. In 1959, this man recorded "Bagels And Bongos," a
fusion of traditional Jewish melodies and Latin rhythms that was so
successful he did almost half a dozen follow-ups, including the immortal
"Pizza And Bongos."

And if that's not enough, Irving is the last of the great cocktail lounge
pianists, from an era where every watering hole worth checking out had to
have a guy playing jazzy, flowery variations on Porter and Gershwin
classics, good enough to warrant close attention but unobtrusive enough to
ignore if you wanted to talk to your date instead of listen. Mr. Fields
played all the top rooms in this town in his day, from the Waldorf-Astoria
to the Firebird Room, and for the last few years he's been happily purveying
his craft at Nino's, which is across the street from his apartment. His hair
may be white now, and he walks slower than he did back in '48, but nobody's
told his fingers that the rest of him is 92 years old. He still plinks the
keys with as much flair and finesse as he did 60 years ago.

Before starting the festivities, he ambled over to various tables taking
requests -- every time he played one of mine, he looked over at me and gave
me a sly smile and a nod. Walk up to him in the middle of a set and he can
hold a conversation with you while playing a medley of Italian songs
covering everything from "O Sole Mio" to the theme from The Godfather. Ask
if you can buy one of the CDs he's got for sale on his piano, however, and
he'll wrap up any song in four bars flat, the quicker to pocket your $16.95.
It's almost as fun to watch as it is to listen to him play.

During one of his breaks, I tried to ask Irving about 1948 and what it was
like to be in the musical vanguard back then. Instead, he started in with a
series of R-rated doctor jokes, and then sang me some of his newest song,
"Left Up-Right Down," which he thinks will be a smash if he can find the
right singer to record it. If it does become a hit, it'll probably be the
first in 50 years to have the word "pep" in it. It really was catchy, though
-- I was humming the damn thing for hours afterwards.

On songwriting: "Have a melody which repeats itself with only slight
variation -- that's how it gets into people's heads. That's what I did with
"Managua, Nicaragua." On playing: "You have to start out playing the melody
straight, so people know what song you're playing. Then you can do all the
flashy things and variations. These kids [I had no idea whether he was
referring to 20-year-olds or 80-year-olds], they start out, they're already
out there, and you don't know what the hell they're playing."

He never did wind up telling me about 1948. And I suspect that I want to
take a trip in the way-back machine a lot more than Irving, or Les Paul, or
Tony Martin do. Their glory days may be behind them, but they seem to be
doing just fine living in the present. Which is more than I can say for my
30-something self. Show me the way out of this century and I'll trade Tila
Tequila for Cyd Charisse in a second.