Dec. 2: Julius LaRosa, "Eh, Cumpari," is 81 today.

La Rosa was born in Brooklyn, New York and joined the United States Navy in 1947 after finishing high school. Arthur Godfrey, a radio and early network television pioneer (and a Naval Reserve officer), heard LaRosa in Pensacola, Florida, where LaRosa was stationed, and offered him a job.

Godfrey was impressed by La Rosa's singing and had him flown to New York to appear on his television show, with Godfrey ending the spot by saying, "When Julie gets out of the Navy he'll come back to see us."

Discharged from the Navy on a Friday, La Rosa went to Godfrey on the following Monday, and a week later he appeared on Godfrey's variety show. He was a regular on both the morning Arthur Godfrey Time and the Wednesday night variety show Arthur Godfrey and His Friends.


Julius La Rosa's appeared on Godfrey's shows from November 19, 1951 to October 19, 1953. When Archie Bleyer, Arthur Godfrey's bandleader, formed Cadence Records in 1952, the first performer signed was La Rosa. Cadence's first single, which was also La Rosa's first recording, was "Anywhere I Wander." It reached the top 30 on the charts, and his next recording, "My Lady Loves To Dance," was a moderate success.


La Rosa's third recording, "Eh, Cumpari" in 1953 hit #1 on the Cash Box chart and #2 on the Billboard chart, and La Rosa got an award as the best new male vocalist of 1953.

Like the other "Little Godfreys," as the cast members were known, Godfrey discouraged La Rosa from hiring a manager or booking agent, preferring to have his staff, and his own agent and manager, Tommy Rockwell and negotiate on La Rosa's behalf.

(Continued below video and Amazon portals ...)

(Press album cover for direct link to the entire Amazon Website):

With hit recordings and his appearances on Arthur Godfrey's shows, La Rosa's popularity grew exponentially. At one point, La Rosa's fan mail eclipsed Godfrey's. A year after La Rosa was hired, he was receiving 7,000 fan letters a week.

On the morning of October 19, 1953 (in a segment of the show broadcast on radio only) after La Rosa had finished singing "Manhattan" on Arthur Godfrey Time, Godfrey fired him on the air, announcing, "that was Julie's swan song with us." La Rosa tearfully met with Godfrey after the broadcast and thanked him for giving him his "break." La Rosa was then met at Godfrey's offices by his lawyer, manager and some reporters.


Singer Ruth Wallis, known for her raunchy double entendre' novelties, recorded "Dear Mr. Godfrey," a biting satire on the matter, which made it to #25 on the Billboard charts in November 1953. Days after firing La Rosa, Godfrey also fired bandleader Archie Bleyer, owner of La Rosa's label Cadence Records, for producing spoken word records for Cadence featuring Chicago-based talk host Don McNeill, whose Don McNeill's Breakfast Club on ABC Radio opposite Godfrey's morning show was considered a direct competitor.


Immediately after his firing, "Eh, Cumpari" became a major hit, followed by "Domani." Ed Sullivan immediately signed La Rosa for appearances on his CBS Toast of the Town TV variety show, which sparked a feud between him and Godfrey. La Rosa's first appearance on Toast of the Town following the firing got a 47.9 Trendex rating, and La Rosa would appear 12 more times on Sullivan's show that year.

La Rosa had a three times a week television series, The Julius La Rosa Show, during the summer of 1955, featuring Russ Case and his Orchestra. The short-lived series lasted only 13 weeks. La Rosa tired of revisiting the Godfrey affair, in part because it had been rehashed so many times, but he was also known to declare publicly that Godfrey was, indeed, the individual who made his career, but always adding, "He wasn't a very nice man."

####

Jan. 2: County singer Roger Miller, "King of the Road, "Dang Me" "England Swings," was born on this date in 1936…

… he died on October 25, 1992.

Roger Dean Miller was famous for his catchy near-novelty songs. His best known records include the country and pop hits "King of the Road,” "Dang Me" and "England Swings,” all recorded in the mid 1960s.

Roger was born in Fort Worth, Texas and raised in Oklahoma. Growing up, he listened to the Grand Ole Opry and Light Crust Doughboys on a Fort Worth station with his cousin's husband Sheb Wooley. Wooley taught Miller his first guitar chords and bought him a fiddle.

Roger used to sneak out of his house and perform in Oklahoma and Texas. When he was 17, he stole a guitar to write songs, but turned himself in the next day. He chose to enlist in the Army to avoid jail.

Near the end of his military service, while stationed in Atlanta, Georgia, Miller played fiddle in the "Circle A Wranglers," a military musical group started by Faron Young. While stationed in South Carolina, an army sergeant whose brother was Kenneth C. Burns from the musical duo Homer and Jethro, convinced Miller to head to Nashville after he was discharged from the Army.

In Nashville, he met with Chet Atkins, who after listening to him, advised him to come back after he polished his act. Miller remained in Nashville and worked as a bellhop at the Andrew Jackson Hotel, to make ends meet; he soon became known as the "singing bellhop."

Eventually, Roger was hired by Minnie Pearl to play fiddle in her band. Later, he  met up with George Jones, who introduced him to music executives from the Starday Records label for an audition. The label was impressed with Miller and awarded him with a session in Houston, accompanied by Jones. Jones and Miller collaborated, writing "Tall, Tall Trees" and "Happy Child."

(Continued below video and Amazon portals ...)

(Press album cover for direct link to the entire Amazon Website):

-----

After starting a family, Miller left for Amarillo, Texas to become a fireman, and while his music career wasn't completely abandoned, was put on the back burner.

Miller met with Ray Price, and was hired as a member of his Cherokee Cowboys. He moved back to Nashville, and penned the song "Invitation to the Blues," which was covered by Rex Allen and later by Price, for whom it became a number three hit on country charts.

Roger wrote "Half a Mind" for Ernest Tubb, "That's the Way I Feel" for Faron Young, and his first number one, "Billy Bayou," which along with "Home" were recorded by Jim Reeves.

Miller became one of the biggest songwriters of the 1950s. However, Bill Anderson would later remark that "Roger was the most talented, and least disciplined person that you could imagine" citing the attempts of Miller's Tree Publishing boss, Buddy Killen to force him to finish a piece. He was also known to give away lines, inciting many Nashville songwriters to follow him around since "everything he said was a potential song."

Miller signed a recording deal with Decca Records in 1958. He was paired with singer Donny Little, who would later gain fame under the name Johnny Paycheck, to perform the Little-penned "A Man Like Me,” and later "The Wrong Kind of Girl." Neither song made the charts.

To make extra money, Miller went on tour and joined Faron Young's band as a drummer, although he had never drummed before. During this period, he signed a record deal with Chet Atkins at RCA Records, for whom Miller recorded "You Don't Want My Love" (also known as "In the Summertime") in 1960, which marked his first appearance on country charts, peaking at #14. The next year, he would make an even bigger impact, breaking through the top 10 with his single "When Two Worlds Collide," co-written with Bill Anderson.

After appearing on late night comedy shows, Miller decided that he might have a chance to go to Hollywood and become an actor. With little money  he signed with Smash Records, asking for $1,600 in cash, in exchange for recording 16 sides. Smash agreed to the proposal, and Miller performed at his first session for the company early in 1964, when he recorded the hits "Dang Me" (which took him under 5 minutes to write) and "Chug-a-Lug.” 

Both songs were released as singles, peaking at #1 and #3 respectively on country charts. Both also fared well on the Billboard Hot 100 reaching #7 and #9. The songs transformed Miller's career. Later that year, he recorded the #15 hit "Do-Wacka-Do," and soon after the biggest hit of his career "King of the Road," which topped Country and Adult Contemporary charts while peaking at #4 on the Billboard 100.

Miller continued to record and tour into the 1990s, charting his final top 20 country hit "Old Friends" with Willie Nelson in 1982. Late in his career he wrote the music and lyrics for the 1985 Tony-award winning Broadway musical Big River, in which he also appeared.

Miller died from lung cancer in 1992, and was posthumously inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame three years later. His songs continued to be recorded by younger artists, with covers of "Tall, Tall Trees" by Alan Jackson and "Husbands and Wives" by Brooks & Dunn, each reaching the number one spot on country charts in the 1990s.

 ####