by Paul Shaffer
When it came to music, my mother also had a sense of humor that surely influenced my own. Example:
At an alarmingly young age, her little Paul had fallen for rock and roll. After discovering the Ronettes and the Four Seasons, the yin and yang of his musical identity, he applied his classical piano training to the Top Ten tunes of the day. He learned them by ear and played them incessantly. The first single he bought was the Supremes’ “You Can’t Hurry Love,” and his first LP The Four Seasons’ Golden Vault of Hits. But Shaffer was never a record collector. He was a keyboard slugger whose interest focused on two-fisted duplications of the sounds he’d heard on the radio. He was smitten with the heroic confections of producer Phil Spector and the erotic cries of Phil’s onetime wife Ronnie. It all came together in a song inspired by Ronnie and sung by the Four Seasons’ high tenor Frankie Valli. Appropriately enough, the tune was entitled “Ronnie,” and the lyrics had our young hero lost in a daydream of sweet romance: “I’ll go on living and keep on forgiving because …you were my first love.”
“Ronnie” was indeed Paul’s first love. He had first seen her with the Ronettes singing “Be My Baby” on American Bandstand. Her high bouffant hair, her tantalizingly short skirt, her heavy mascara, and that voice—sweet as honey, wicked as sin. She was the very definition of feminine heat. He had learned to play “Ronnie” on piano, memorized the words, and ingested it whole.
“I’ll go on living and keep on forgiving” became his mantra.
To his own spirited accompaniment, he sang the song over and over again. He rushed home from school to attack the piano so he could re-create the mood that set his imagination soaring.
“I’ll go on living and keep on forgiving” was the sound that filled the Shaffer household.
He couldn’t stop playing it, couldn’t stop singing it, couldn’t stop offering up this cry of teenage angst.
“I’ll go on living and keep on forgiving,” he emoted with even more impassioned conviction.
“For God’s sake, Paul!” his mom shouted from the kitchen one day. “Forgive Ronnie already and come eat your lunch!”
Meet my dad.
Bernard Shaffer, barrister, solicitor, notary public, respected civic leader, skilled litigator, and life of the party. He had a little temper on him, but a great passion for music—not just any music, mind you, but the most sophisticated jazz on the planet. Dad was a connoisseur. And although he liked his role as big legal eagle in the little nest of Thunder Bay, he, like Mom, felt the allure of brighter lights.
Example:
The Shaffer family is off to Vegas!
Young Paul is not yet a teenager, but fully aware of Sin City’s well-advertised enticements. Most of those enticements are musical. This is the early sixties, the heyday of the Rat Pack. Sinatra is at his ring-a-ding-dingiest. Dean, Peter, and Joey are by his side, and Sammy has converted. All’s right with the world.
When Bernard, Shirley, and Paul arrive, the sun is shining and the city is sparkling. Paul is riveted by the cabdriver’s special patois. The Desert Inn is referred to as the “D.I.” The Tropicana is the “Trop.” The Riviera is the “Riv.” The language carries a magic of its own.
Walking into the Sahara, I’m galvanized by the ringing sounds of the slot machines, but even more by the swinging sounds of the band. My heart leaps at the sight of Louis Prima performing in the open lounge. Louis’s backup band is the world-famous Witnesses led by tenor man Sam Butera. Prima’s duet partner is Keely Smith who, with her perfectly-in-place black bangs and stoic facade, is the prototype for Cher. Louis is singing “When You’re Smiling” in his “Louis Armstrong meets Dean Martin” voice. Then he’s singing “Buona Sera,” then “Angelina,” then he and Keely trade licks on “That Old Black Magic.” Riveted by the show, I refuse to move as my parents tell me our bags are being transported up to our room and it’s time to freshen up.
When we reach the room, my father immediately scans the Vegas entertainment guide and gets mad.
“The travel agent told me she was at the Sahara,” he says. “Now I see she’s at the Riviera. Well, if that’s the case we’re moving to the Riviera.”
“Bernie,” says Shirley, “we just got here.”
My father doesn’t care. “We’re here but she’s not. We’re leaving.”
“Who’s she?” I ask.
“The Divine One,” he answers.
“Sarah, Dad?” I ask.
“Yes, Sarah,” he says, pronouncing the name like a prayer. “Sarah Vaughan.”
Bags in tow, we check out of the Sahara and grab a cab for the Riv. I love scooting around Vegas, especially in pursuit of jazz.
The Riv is cool, although inside it looks just like the Sahara. Another endless ocean of slots.
But that evening, the music in the lounge—Sarah’s music—is different. It’s a world away from Louis, Keely, and Sam. It’s quiet; it’s subtle; it swings gently, firmly, intoxicatingly; but mostly it emanates from a vocal prowess that, according to my dad, “creates the sound of honey-coated perfection.”
I view the show not from my parents’ table—kids aren’t allowed in the lounge—but standing up on a raised area surrounded by a low railing that lets me see Sarah from afar. She is wonderful. My elevated position also allows me to lean over and stare into the deep cleavage of the waitresses, who are also wonderful.
Sassy Sarah sings a set of standards, the highlight of which is “Misty.” The audience gives her a standing ovation, with Bernie and Shirley leading the cheers. Dad turns around to make sure I’m still there. He nods his head as if to say, “Son, take note. This is the music that matters.” I do take note. I also see how Sarah, upon reaching the bridge, allows her pianist to seamlessly complete the vocal line as the spotlight moves from her to him. The Divine One disappears, only to return with an even more baroque lick. The audience is surprised and delighted. I understand that jazz and show business are not complete strangers.
Ironically, when we return to Thunder Bay I’ll discover a different music by Sarah: “Broken Hearted Melody,” her only record to reach the hit parade. Neither she nor my father liked the song—it wasn’t jazz, it wasn’t a Gershwin-style standard, it was mere pop—but I loved it. In fact, it opened up my ears. It had the same chord changes as Gene McDaniels’s “Hundred Pounds of Clay” and represented an advance beyond the basic rock and roll song structure—four chords instead of three. Within days, I was rocking that fourth chord.
Back in Vegas, though, I was in love with Sarah’s fabulous standards and the waitresses’ fabulous bosoms. I figured this was surely the high point of my Vegas experience, but I figured wrong. As Steve Allen wrote, this was only “the start of something big.”
Something big turned out to be something late. The notion of “late,” incidental to some, loomed large in my personal mythology. It was in Vegas that I learned the inviolable axiom “the later the hipper.”
“Take a nap,” said my father, the day before we were scheduled to fly back to the frozen north.
“I want to go swimming,” I said, thinking of the bikini-clad waitresses who served poolside.
“Then nap in a lounge chair,” he urged, “because I have a special treat tonight.”
“More Sarah, Dad?”
“No, a by-invitation-only late show that doesn’t start till 1 a.m. It’s the show Juliet Prowse does so other entertainers on the Strip can see her after they get off.”
“And we’ve got seats?” I asked.
“Ringside!”
I’ve been told that Marcel Proust described the socialites in turn-of-the-century Paris with poetic brilliance. They say that Henry James captured high society on Washington Square in a way that will never be duplicated. I cannot compete with the literary masters of yesteryear, nor will I try. I invoke those names, however, only to let you know how I yearn to do justice to what I experienced that night at Juliet Prowse’s by-invitation-only show that began, as her then-boyfriend Sinatra termed it, “in the wee small hou
rs of the morning.”
You know, there are show-biz buzzes and then there are show-biz buzzes.
This buzz hit me as soon as my parents and I got off the elevator. The slots were still ringing, the roulette wheels still turning, but there was a stream of energy even stronger than the gaming passion that flowed through the casino floor straight to the showroom. Despite the late hour, my state of fatigue had morphed into a state of high excitement.
As we entered the showroom, my dad shmeared the maître d’ a twenty to seat us near the stage, but our table turned out to be in the rear. As Dad tried to better our position, my eyes were jumping out of my head. I was craning my neck so violently I nearly twisted my head off. I wanted to see stars. I did see stars, or at least I thought I did. Wasn’t that Frank walking in with his famous confidant Jilly? Wasn’t that Buddy Hackett, the comic from the Sullivan show? And hey, speaking of comics, wasn’t that Fat Jack Leonard, whose take-my-wife jokes were my folks’ favorites? That had to be Red Buttons. That had to be Shirley MacLaine. That had to be Bob Mitchum. “No,” said Mom, “that’s Van Heflin.” I recognized—or at least I thought I did—Jerry Lewis, another early idol, whose yearly telethon became as sacred to me as fasting on Yom Kippur. “That’s not Jerry,” said Dad, “that’s Jan Murray.”
“I know the difference between Jerry and Jan,” I said. “That’s Jerry.”
“Doesn’t matter,” said Mom, “they’re all here.”
Mom was right. The world was here. The world that remained unknown to the average man and woman was making itself known to me. The world of entertainers, usually hidden in dressing rooms and darkened limos, had, like a gorgeous woman stepping out of her clothes, suddenly exposed itself to me.
“Holy shit!” I heard someone behind me say. “It’s the Great One! Jackie Gleason!”
As if being in the same room with so many stars wasn’t enough, minutes before showtime we were ushered up to the ringside table Dad had coveted. We were practically in the spotlight.
We soon learned why. Opening comic Jackie Gayle needed a little kid as a foil. The waiter spotted me as a prime candidate and moved us up front.
Gayle called me to the stage. Surprisingly, I wasn’t the least bit nervous. He asked me how many TVs we had in our house. I said, “One.”
His joke depended upon our having more than one TV.
“Don’t you have more than one?” he asked.
“No,” I answered in a deadpan tone that rivaled Jack Benny’s. “Just one.”
And with that, I wrecked Jackie Gayle’s act. He sent me back to my seat. He was glowering, but I was glowing. I was in show business!
When our salads arrived, the waiter asked me, “What kind of dressing, sir?”
Always a picky eater, I said, “No dressing.”
“No dressing?” the waiter repeated. “That’s the way to treat girls, not salad.”
Mom shot the waiter a menacing look, as if to say, “Careful, this is a proper young Canadian you’re addressing.”
A few minutes later the orchestra swelled and Juliet appeared, covered from head to toe in feathers. Then, in a flash, the feathers fell and my life changed. My view of womanhood changed. Her moves, her curves, her bends and bounces had me soaring over the moon.
“Does she have to get undraped in every single number?” asked my mom.
“Please, God,” I silently prayed, “let her get undraped in every single number.”
God granted my prayer.
At the end of her last number, I looked at my little Davy Crockett wristwatch and saw it was nearly 3 a.m. “Happy?” Mom asked me.
“Boy, am I happy,” I said. “I’ve never been happier.”
There were other happy out-of-town moments with my parents. If Vegas was one temple of entertainment for show-biz-loving Jews, the other was surely Miami Beach. It was there, in the splendor of the Eden Roc Hotel (close to the famed Fontainebleau), where we caught Billy Daniels, the over-the-top song stylist with the big-bottomed black voice. Don’t let anyone tell you that Billy Daniels didn’t know his audience. He closed with “My Yiddishe Mama.” The Jews plotzed. His opening act: Myron Cohen. Cohen was king of the Jewish joke. But as my parents pointed out to me, the more Yiddish his punch lines, the more British-sounding his setups. Man, Mom and Dad were hip! And perhaps the greatest manifestation of their hipness came in the form of recreation and libation. They knew how to throw a party. Let’s go …
Chapter 6
Shaffer A-Go-Go
Cocktail parties were essential. In fact, social drinking and its ensuing merriment were Mom and Dad’s way of coping with the Canadian climate. They lived their lives as they imagined Sinatra lived his. He had his clan; they had theirs. They had a party culture that involved a great deal of creativity. It also involved me.
There was, for instance, the beatnik party where Mom dressed in a leotard and Dad wore a beret. A hip singer and comic named Don Francks came all the way from Toronto to entertain. He covered songs by the jazz duo Jackie and Roy, in that cool vibrato-less style of crooning. Dad informed me that I was to learn bongos. “What’s a beatnik party without bongos?” asked Dad.
I liked beating the bongos. In fact, I beat them night and day until Mom cut me off. “Stop beating the bongos and beat it down to the corner to get me a pack of du Mauriers.”
When Dad got home, it was “Get back on the bongos. This beatnik party has got to swing wild.”
To see my parents, respectable citizens by day, turn into make-believe beatniks by night was strange, especially when their behavior was fueled by my bongo grooves and Johnnie Walker Red. And especially when my father, before reciting the poetry of Lawrence Ferlinghetti, decided to break into his famous Al Jolson impression, falling on one knee and cryin’ “Mammy” and “Swanee.” Now I was accompanying him on piano. I did so with a degree of trepidation because, depending upon how many precisely proportioned martinis Dad had downed, my playing could throw him off. Other times, when he’d ask me to play a classical piece before, say, an important circuit court judge, I might not be completely prepared. This would incense Dad. He didn’t hesitate to criticize me right then and there, as if he were cross-examining a witness in a court of law. I hated these public humiliations but dared not complain.
Don’t misunderstand. In most ways my father was a sweetheart. He was also a hoot. While at the University of Toronto, he was a star in the collegiate follies and had worked with Wayne and Shuster, the great Canadian comedy team. He had dreamed of a career in show business, but the Depression hit and caution kept him home. Subsequently he called the courtroom his stage. I understood why he liked to ape Al Jolson and consort with Don Francks, whom he considered the Lenny Bruce of the Frozen Frontier. He wanted to entertain, to be noticed, to host his friends and peers with originality and humor. But Dad also struggled with a hidden rage whose source I could never trace. The cocktail party was a time when his complexities and contradictions might unexpectedly surface.
Mom anticipated such celebrations as eagerly as Dad. When she imbibed, her normally low-volume voice got loud and her laughter got raucous. Her transformation made me a touch uncomfortable. I preferred Mom to be plain ol’ Mom, not the Mom who said to me, “Paul, your father and I are having a twist party. Can you find us a go-go dancer for Saturday night? We’ll bring in a stage and it’ll be absolutely marvelous.”
It was a challenge. My folks had seen Chubby Checker on the Ed Sullivan Show. They knew about the Peppermint Lounge in New York City. But their real aim was to re-create Arthur, the trendy disco owned by Richard Burton’s former wife, Sybil. That’s where all the stars twisted the night away. My folks wanted to do the same and they reasoned—quite correctly—that a go-go dancer would spirit the party.
After some research, I managed to find a girl who, at eighteen, was a year older than I. She had appeared on a local TV dance show, and her name was Bonnie Carniato. Her costume consisted of a flimsy fringy skirt, a sparkly top, and the requisite white go-go b
oots. Her best attribute was her long legs. And, take it from me, the girl could twist. “Twistin’ the Night Away” became the recurrent motif. I must have played the goddamn thing a hundred times.
“Fabulous party!” Mom exclaimed at 2:30 a.m.
I was exhausted. My fingers ached from banging out all those twist numbers. But Bonnie’s appreciative fans wanted to keep on twistin’. How long, though, could I watch these middle-aged, overweight Canadians get down with their bad selves? Get me out of here.
“I got to get some sleep, Mom,” I said.
“Just one more set, son.”
Mom’s dutiful son capitulated.
Finally, an hour later, the party pooped out. Dad handed Bonnie a fistful of Canadian dollars.
Bonnie thanked him. I walked her to the door and thanked her as well.
“Your parents are great, Paul,” she said. “They throw a helluva party. And you could almost do this for a living.”
Bonnie, bless her heart, saw my future.
It wasn’t anything I could say out loud. But I did say it silently in the secret chambers of my heart. As I kept playing songs like the Ronettes’ “Be My Baby,” written by Ellie Greenwich, Jeff Barry, and producer Phil Spector, I saw myself flying on the wings of the music, flying over Lake Superior, over Lake Michigan, over the Motown studio in Detroit where the Sound of Young America rose up like a “Heat Wave” burning in my heart, flying over Alan Freed in Cleveland and Dick Clark in Philly, where the kids were lining up for American Bandstand, flying straight into New York City and landing at the feet of Ronnie Ronette herself. I’d try to speak, but the words wouldn’t come. I was too timid, too unsure of myself. No Canadian man-child could hope to win the love of a lady who unabashedly demands, “Be My Baby.” My flight would end. My dream would dissolve.
