 After
his early days as a big-band sax player, Oakland native Tony Martin
followed in the footsteps of his childhood idols Bing Crosby and Russ Colombo
(and later Al Jolson) and turned to singing. With a couple of hit
records and some movies behind him, he shipped off to serve in the U.S.
Army air force during World War II. When he returned, the romantic
balladeer had a hit record with his To Each His Own and was asked
to go into the Copa. The following is a recounting of one of his
memorable nights as a headliner at the Copacabana:
.. I remember one time Jan Peerce, who had a great record called Bluebird of Happiness, came in. He had just done two operas at the Met that night, and he came into the Copa with his children. One of his children had a birthday. They sat right up front. That night was so crowded - it was a Saturday night - they eliminated the chorus girl numbers and put in extra tables. I was doing my show and I had hardly any room to spread my hands when I sang. There was a fellow sitting ringside with his girl, and he said to me, "Hey, how come you stay so thin?" "Cause fat singers don't make any money," I said. Just then Jan Peerce said, "I'm a fat singer and I make a lot of money. Doug Coudy put on all the house lights. "Who is this up here?" I said. Jan Peerce came down onto the stage and he sang a song. He broke up the audience. He tore it apart. I offered him the microphone, and he says, "I won't be needing that." When he was finished, I said, "And now, ladies and gentlemen, I will finish my show at Lindy's," and I walked off. Doug said to me, "Why don't you go and finish your show?" "The show is finished," I said. "You got a pretty good start. Finish the show out there. Jan Peerce." 
Tony Martin was the recipient of the 1992 Society of Singers ELLA Lifetime Achievement Award and is vice president of the board of directors of SOS. One of the only entertainers to have four stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, the ninety-five-year-old Tony Martin still performs in concert attended by his lovely dancer-actress wife Cyd Charisse, whom he married in 1948. Tony Martin and Cyd Charisse are pictured here at a champagne reception following his show at Feinstein's at Loews Regency, January-February 2008. |
As the personal manager of Johnnie Ray - the successful singing
sensation of the early fifties - Bernie Lang (who also handled Julius LaRosa,
the Four Lads and later, Englebert Humperdinck, Shirley MacLaine and others)
was with the young star when he hit the big time: his opening at
the Copacabana. "When Johnnie opened in April of 1952, it was a huge,
huge success. The Copa never had an opening like that - before
or after."
A
middle-aged mother and housewife, broke and unknown, Roberta Sherwood became
one of the all-time great nightclub success stories, capturing the hearts
of audiences everywhere with her strong, sweet voice, her simple, sincere
approach to ballads, and her trademarks - banging a cymbal, tapping her
foot, wearing glasses and draping a sweater over her shoulders. The
elder daughter of old-time minstrel showman, Robert Sherwood, she and her
sister Anne started their own vaudeville and nightclub act, appearing in
1932 in a Miami Silver Slipper revue, directed by handsome ex-Shubert
Broadway vet, Don Lanning. She quit show business to marry him and
struggled to continue to perform while raising a family - singing in lounge
bars, at a Kiwanis Club party, a firemen's ball or with a local dance band.
With her future seeming more and more hopeless, she finally landed a job
at a small late-hour drinking joint called Murray Franklin's in Miami Beach,
and the rest is history, as Walter Winchell recounts the story: