Nino Tempo
Nino Tempo (born Antonino LoTempio, January 6, 1935) is an American musician, singer, and actor.
Nino Tempo was born in Niagara Falls, New York. A musical prodigy, he learned to play the clarinet and the tenor saxophone as a child. He was a talent show winner at four years of age and appeared on television with Benny Goodman at age seven. When his family relocated to California, he featured on the Horace Heidt radio show, performing a Benny Goodman clarinet solo. A child actor, he worked in motion pictures in such movies as 1949's The Red Pony and in 1953's The Glenn Miller Story featuring James Stewart. He was a sought-after session musician, working as a member of the famous session band the Wrecking Crew, also working with Elkie Brooks, and recording with Maynard Ferguson (Live at the Peacock, 1956). Via a Bobby Darin recording session, Tempo made connections with Atlantic Records and contracted with its subsidiary Atco Records.
However, Nino Tempo is known best for his 1963 duet "Deep Purple" on Atco with his sister Carol (singing under the stage name April Stevens), which scored No.1 on the Billboard Hot 100. The song won the 1964 Grammy Award for Best Rock And Roll Recording, selling more than one million copies and earning a gold disc.[1]
During late 1973, a little less than ten years after "Deep Purple" had topped the Hot 100, Tempo scored #53 on his last Hot 100 hit with the (mostly) instrumental "Sister James" as Nino Tempo And 5th Ave. Sax, an obvious play on Saks Fifth Avenue. Recorded at A&M Records studio with the backing, writing, producing, and arranging of Jeff Barry, "Sister James" became one of the first instrumental disco records to score the national charts. "Sister James" is often classified as an example of Northern Soul.
During 1975, Tempo played saxophone on John Lennon's album Rock 'n' Roll, and was a featured soloist on The Kenny Rankin Album (1976).
Tempo continues to perform to the present day.
Discography
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As sideman
With Maynard Ferguson
- Dimensions (EmArcy, 1955)
With the Modern Jazz Quartet
- MJQ & Friends: A 40th Anniversary Celebration (Atlantic, 1994)
See also
References
- ^ Murrells, Joseph (1978). The Book of Golden Discs (2nd ed.). London: Barrie and Jenkins Ltd. p. 167. ISBN 0-214-20512-6.
External links
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Artists | |
- 1935 births
- Living people
- People from Niagara Falls, New York
- American male child actors
- American clarinetists
- American male film actors
- American jazz singers
- American male singers
- American saxophonists
- American people of Italian descent
- Grammy Award winners
- American session musicians
- Atco Records artists
- RCA Victor artists
- The Wrecking Crew (music) members
- Male actors of Italian descent