In a message dated 6/14/2006 9:11:23 A.M. Pacific Standard Time,
jt417552@aol.com writes:
The only hotel on the south strip corner was
the Marina.
Opps correction. The Tropicana was there. That round area with escalators on
both sides leading to the long hallway and the rear building was the lounge
that the Stan Kenton band played at in about 1960 If you search Stan Kenton
and see some old album covers it shows the then lounge area on the "Kenton At
The Tropicana" album.
As I'm a former musician I heard an interesting story about that. Kenton had
just hired Dalton Smith as the new lead trumpet. Dalton's only previous
experience was as a student at North Texas State in the jazz band. Kenton
procured most of his road musicians from that band as they had the Kenton book to
practice. Dalton was a great player when he joined the band but... Kenton
demanded so much volume that it was like going from little league baseball to the
major league in strength. At the end of opening night Kenton was in the
audience talking with a former lead player, Marky Markowitz. Markowitz glanced up
on the stage and saw only one band member still on the stand. A trumpet
player slumped over his chair, exhausted and looking at the music. Marky turned
back to Kenton and said. "I see you have a new lead player." Smith went on to
play on approx. 21 Kenton albums, mostly as a studio musician in Los
Angeles. While with the band he met and married Marilyn King of the King sisters
when the band played in Lake Tahoe. About 6 months later when I heard the band
at Lake Tahoe, Smith was louder than everbody else in the band combined on a
final note. Not a screech high note just a high D or E. The arrangement of
musicians was built for volume too. Five Trumpets, Five Trombones, two of them
bass trombones. Five saxes, one a bari and one a base sax. Five melophonium
players [a trumpet/french horn type instrument with the bell facing out. A
side note on Kenton: He had such a terrible sense of rhythm that when he would
count off a tune, "One... Two... .... One Two Three Four" he'd speed up at the
end. The band knew the correct tempo and would all come in right.
JT, fleet duoua deet
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