Chapter Thirteen
I was still fifteen when I confided to my dad one afternoon that I wanted to play my songs for Alan Freed. My father sprang into action. All a New York City firefighter had to do was show his badge and he would be admitted as a V.I.P. anywhere in the city, from the finest restaurant to a museum, movie theater, or radio station WINS.
I don’t know if Alan really thought I had talent or if he was just being nice to the fireman’s kid, but he listened attentively to my songs, and he even took time to explain how the process worked. He told me to look in the phone book under “Record Companies,” make an appointment, and play my songs live for the A&R man in charge of finding artists and repertoire (a fancy name for songs). Usually a label had its own publishing company. If an A&R man liked one of my songs, he might offer me a contract and an advance of twenty-five dollars. The contract was simple. The publishing company would own the copyright and receive all the publishing income. The writer would get a standard writer’s mechanical and sheet music royalty minus the advance and the cost of recording a demo in one of the nearby demo studios such as Associated, Dick Charles, or Bell Sound. Alan chuckled when he said Atlantic Records didn’t use an outside studio. “If Jerry and Ah-mond like a song,” he said, “they’ll set up a mic in their office and record a demo on the spot.” That’s what I thought he’d said: “Jerry and Ah-mond.”
I would soon learn that Alan had said “Jerry and Ahmet,” referring to Jerry Wexler and Ahmet Ertegun, partners in Atlantic Records whose sharp intuition and lifelong love of jazz, blues, and other black music would bring career longevity to both. In 1957, at forty and thirty-four, Jerry and Ahmet were zealous in their quest for men and women of exceptional talent who might contribute even further to Atlantic’s success. They went to jazz clubs in big northern cities, churches in small southern towns, and bars wherever they found them. Their roster included Solomon Burke, Ruth Brown, Clyde McPhatter, and Ray Charles.
I didn’t know any of that when I opened a Manhattan phone book to “Record Companies” that night and wrote down the address for Atlantic Records. All I knew was that Alan Freed had spoken the name, which made it as good a place as any to start. Rather than call for an appointment and risk rejection, I thought I would just go there and see if someone would listen to my songs. The next day, less than ten minutes after the last school bell had rung, I was on an express train from Kings Highway to Manhattan wearing a pink sweater set, a black felt skirt with a pink poodle on it, a ponytail, white bobby sox, and a pair of white sneakers. Along with my schoolbooks in one hand and sheet music in the other, I carried the belief that I was as good as anyone out there. I still had that feeling when I got off the BMT at 57th Street. Someone was going to get her songs recorded. Why not me?
The elevator in the building on West 56th Street must have been the slowest elevator in New York City. My family could have eaten an entire meal in Patsy’s Restaurant before I reached my floor. On the way up I thought about my presentation. Since my dad’s wire recordings were sonically, shall we say, not the best way to present a song, I had come prepared to play my songs in person. In those days every A&R man worth his salt had a recently tuned piano in his office. They were so eager to find new talent that most were willing to listen to young people playing live in their offices.
Finally I arrived at the door that said Atlantic Records. I turned the knob, walked in, and nearly bumped into a desk with a woman seated behind it. She might have been a secretary, a bookkeeper, or a receptionist. Probably she was all three. When she looked up and asked, “May I help you?” I answered with a question.
“Is anyone available to listen to my songs?”
Before she could decide between saying no or asking her bosses if they wanted to listen to a teenage girl who had just wandered in off the street, Jerry and Ahmet came out and escorted me to the piano in their office so quickly that I didn’t have time to get nervous. Their shared office contained a piano and two catty-corner desks. A room next to theirs was both the office of Nesuhi Ertegun (Ahmet’s brother) and the art department.
Ahmet and Jerry listened with interest as I played each song in turn, in response to their nods and words of encouragement. When I had finished playing the last song I looked at them expectantly.
“You got talent,” Jerry declared.
Ahmet looked at Jerry and then at me.
“Yeah, man, very soulful. Come back and see us when you got more songs.”
As I rode down in the slow elevator my shoulders sagged with disappointment because they hadn’t offered me a contract or an advance, but by the time I got to the lobby my optimism had returned. After all, they hadn’t said, “Don’t call us, we’ll call you.” I took that as a triumph and walked to Seventh Avenue with my shoulders back and my head high. Anyway, there were other record companies.
The next afternoon, inspired by their chart-topping success with Paul Anka’s “Diana,” I called ABC-Paramount. The secretary who answered the phone said, “I’m sorry, we’re not seeing any new artists.” I had practically worn out my copy of “Diana,” not only because I loved the song but also because I couldn’t figure out what instrument had played the distinctive sound in the catchy instrumental hooks. That recording, by a Canadian only seven months older than I, was so popular that I was certain his A&R man would want to hear my songs. Even if they weren’t seeing any new artists, surely they’d see me. I kept calling until a secretary named Betty Berlin gave me an appointment with her boss.
Don Costa had started out as a guitarist. He and Bucky Pizzarelli had played the dueling guitars on Vaughn Monroe’s “Ghost Riders in the Sky.” Later in his career Don would produce, arrange, and conduct for Trini Lopez, Kenny Rankin, Donny Osmond, Marv Johnson, Sammy Davis Jr., and Frank Sinatra. In 1957 Don was head of A&R at ABC-Paramount Records. His job included signing artists, choosing songs, producing, and arranging.
The day of my appointment I spent the entire subway ride to Times Square trying not to be nervous. By the time I entered the impressive reception area leading to ABC-Paramount’s suite of offices at 1501 Broadway, I was bold and confident. I gave my name to the receptionist. She put down her Vogue magazine and called Mr. Costa’s secretary. After confirming that I had an appointment, the receptionist pointed to a seating area, asked me to wait there, then resumed perusing her magazine. As the minutes ticked by, my confidence began to wane. How foolish of me to expect an important A&R man to be on time! When at last his secretary emerged, my self-assurance had all but vanished. Betty Berlin introduced herself to me, escorted me into Mr. Costa’s office, presented me to him, and walked out.
Mr. Costa could not have been more affable. With a few pleasantries he made me feel that this meeting was no less important to him than a meeting with one of the label’s top artists. Then we got down to business. He invited me to sit at the piano and said, “Let me hear what you’ve got.”
The first song I played was “Leave, Schkeeve.” As soon as I started playing, his attentive demeanor and my familiarity with the material restored my confidence. At the end of the song, he asked if I had another. I played five songs with no visible reaction or comment from Mr. Costa other than, “Do you have another song?” Finally I ran out of songs, and the outcome I least expected happened. Mr. Costa offered me a recording contract.
Oh my God, I thought. Is he seriously inviting me to be on the same label as Steve Lawrence, Eydie Gormé, Lloyd Price, and Paul Anka??
He was.
Moments before, I had been a high school student pulling pages of self-composed pop songs from a school notebook. Now a man with the power to make such decisions was offering me a recording contract with a major label. As I pondered the possibilities, I was brought back to reality by the recollection that I hadn’t wanted to be a solo artist. I had come hoping to get my songs recorded, and if the subject of who would sing them came up, I was going to propose an audition for the Cosines. But when I explained all that to Mr. Costa, he said, “I don’t see any reason to audition the group. You have more than enough talent to be a successful artist on your own.”
Talk about conflicting emotions! I was ecstatic that he wanted to sign me and at the same time anxious about breaking the news to my fellow Cosines. How could I tell Iris, Joel, and Lenny that I had been offered a solo contract and the A&R man had no interest in hearing the rest of the group?
Mr. Costa signaled the end of our meeting by standing up and saying that ABC-Paramount’s legal department would give me a contract on the way out for my parents to sign. He extended his hand and said, “I look forward to working with you.”
Returning his handshake, I said, “I look forward to working with you, too, Mr. Costa.”
“Call me Don,” he said.
As I began to gather my books and my music, I remembered that I hadn’t asked him about the sound on “Diana.” When I did, he confided almost conspiratorially that it was a guitar and a saxophone playing in unison. I was thrilled to learn this, first, because I never would have figured it out on my own, and second, because he considered me worthy of sharing an arranger’s trade secret.
Escorting me out of his office, he asked if I’d like to attend one of his recording sessions later that week.
Would I? Were Steve and Eydie married?
My providential day continued when I found both my parents in a period of reconciliation at home. When I burst in with the news and showed them the contract, they were as delighted as I was, and they were particularly proud that I had accomplished this entirely on my own. But they had some reservations. Their primary concern was making sure that the contract wouldn’t keep me away from my studies. I assured them that it wouldn’t. A lawyer friend of my father’s came over after supper to review the contract. Once my parents determined that the only thing required of me was that I record a certain number of songs every year for the next three years at ABC-Paramount’s option, for which the record company would pay me what the lawyer confirmed was a standard beginning artist’s royalty after certain costs were recouped, all three of us signed the contract, thereby making official my status as a recording artist with ABC-Paramount Records, Inc. The perils of the “after certain costs are recouped” clause wouldn’t become known to me during my term with ABC-Paramount. I would never sell enough units under that contract to recoup the cost of the coffee Mr. Costa—Don—drank at my first session.
If Lenny, Joel, and Iris were disappointed the next day when I told them I had been signed as a solo artist, they gave no sign of it. All three of my friends were generous in recognizing the offer as an exceptional opportunity, and they encouraged me to take full advantage of it. That afternoon, as I pushed my way onto a crowded Manhattan-bound express with the signed contract securely tucked among the pages of my loose-leaf notebook, recoupment was the farthest thing from my mind.