I've been listening to a lot of this.

I'm pretty sure I've got that one. I've also got an original album CD reissue with Prima and Keely Smith. Plus various others.

There was a great documentary on Prima, with lots of live performances, though as per the norm, no full performances of songs.

Prima was on Capitol. Mosaic do boxes and license Capitol recordings. I'd love to see a Mosaic box on Prima. Or a Bear Family box.

The first time I heard of the name Louis Prima was back in the '80s when he was mentioned in the newspaper comic strip "Zippy the Pinhead" by Bill Griffith. Or was that Griffin? Anyway, I knew that strip was always ironic and full of non sequiturs and so I didn't take Louis Prima seriously until I heard his "Just a Gigolo" in the 1989 film, "Mad Dog and Glory", starring Robert DeNiro, Uma Thurman, and Bill Murray. Then I became a fan of Louis Prima.

Extreme trivia re Prima... Two of the dancers with his band were George and Amelia Landry, but their parents would not permit them to tour with Prima as she felt they were too young. Later on, when Amelia married and had children of her own, she encouraged their passion for entertaining, largely because her own parents had prevented her from following her dream of dancing professionally. Her sons each had solo musical careers until they finally recorded an album with their aforementioned uncle George in the mid-70s, titled "The Wild Tchoupitoulas." After recording that album, the brothers united and began performing together as the Neville Brothers and are still together 40 years later.

Thanks for refreshing my memory on that piece of trivia, Jon Tyler! Yes, I remember reading that somewhere. I've got The Wild Tchopitoulas on CD, their lone album. And all the Neville stuff up to '93 at least. And I'm still collecting Meters and Aaron and Art. And I've got Bo Dollis & the Wild Magnolias. So I can have my own little Mardi Gras parade over here.

Many 'boomers were introduced to Louis Prima via his work in Disney's The Jungle Book, released in 1967. He was the voice of King Louie, the orangutan.

He's a perfect mix of Dean Martin and Louis Armstrong.

I always wondered if they tried to get him to play Scat Cat in The Aristocats, too.

Mosaic did a set of early Prima:

The Complete Brunswick & Vocalion Recordings Of Louis Prima And Wingy Manone 1924-1937

Currently oop - great set if you can find it.

I didn't know Louis Prima recorded with Wingy Manone! Or are they just sharing a box set here?

You mean like this one from 1994?

one of our favorites for long car trips.

Dugan, is that a Mosaic or a Bear Family box of goodness?

One for all you literary hounds who secretly yearn for the great outdoors:

Sam Butera blows hard:



Sam Butera - The Big Horn 1959

from http://www.naondadosambarock.blogspot.c ... 9/sam-bu...

Sam Butera spent much of his career leading Louis Prima's band, but his career continued long after Prima's death, coming to include sounds and styles far beyond Prima's brand of New Orleans jazz. A rock, R&B, and jazz legend, Butera is a towering crossover figure at the saxophone and as a bandleader.

He was born in New Orleans to Italian-American parents. His father Joseph owned a butcher shop in a black section of the city, and played the guitar and the concertina in his spare time. At a wedding he was taken to at age seven, Sam Butera first saw and heard a saxophone, and, with his father's blessings, asked to take lessons. He studied the clarinet at school but eventually returned to the sax, and at age 18 was featured in Look magazine (Life's major competitor) as one of the top young jazzmen in the country. He got a gig with Ray MicKinley right out of high school, and also played with the bands of Tommy Dorsey and Joe Reichman. His major influences in those years included Charlie Ventura, Lester Young, Gene Ammons, Charlie Parker, and Big Jay McNeely; he seemed to gravitate naturally to swing and bebop. Ultimately, however, the biggest influence on his playing was Lee Allen, a member of Paul Gayten's band, with which he frequently played.

Butera formed his own group -- inspired by Gayten's band -- after returning to New Orleans, and they quickly began a four-year engagement at the 500 Club, which was owned by Louis Prima's brother. His sound reflected a vast range of influences, including modern jazz and R&B, and in 1951 Butera cut a pair of raunchy R&B instrumental sides that might have figured in the early history of white rock & roll if only they'd gotten out at the time. He also had a featured spot in a Woody Herman concert that yielded both a chance for a new tour and a recording contract with RCA.

The resulting sessions in the fall of 1953 gave Butera a chance to rock out in an alternately soft and sweet, or hard and playful manner. There weren't any significant sales, but RCA had him back in early 1954 for a series of sessions of its R&B-oriented Groove label (home of Piano Red, amongst others), and his version of "I Don't Want to Set the World on Fire" was a modest regional hit.

He played some R&B shows, including a celebrated tour as part of Alan Freed's first East Coast rock & roll showcase, and Butera's loud, wild sax sound won him an enthusiastic following. By 1955, however, he was back doing jazz with Ella Fitzgerald and Louie Bellson. He finally hooked up with Louis Prima and spent the next 20 years leading his band, the Witnesses. Butera's own record releases were cut short, with only a handful of his Groove sides (including a vocal performance, "Giddyap Baby") ever issued at the time.

Butera achieved financial security over the next 20 years working for Prima, and only then, in the mid-'70s, began re-emerging as a performer in his own right.

Sam Butera - The Big Horn (1959)

01. La Vie en Rose
02. All the Way
03. Tennessee Waltz
04. Love is a Many-splendored Thing
05. Too Young
06. Around the World
07. Three Coins in the Fountain
08. I Love Paris
09. On the Street Where You Live
10. Hey, There
11. Moulin Rouge
12. Rock-a-bye Your Baby

FYI... Sam Butera passed away a few weeks ago.

I didn't know that. That is very sad news.