"Magic Ukulele Waltz"

 "Singin' in the Rain"

 "When I Take My Vacation in Harlem"

UkeTalk: Vincent, tell us about your early music training and how the ukulele became an important instrument to you.

Vincent Cortese: My musical beginnings kind of started the night I sat in front of my old black and white TV on February 9, 1964 and watched The Beatles on Ed Sullivan as a soon to be 8 year old boy. It was like being hit by lightning. I wanted a guitar immediately, but had to wait until I was 15 as my father had left us high and dry a couple of years prior and we were some of those poor kids who never knew we were poor, just couldn't figure out why the universal answer was "no" to every request. I had an uncle who was only 4 years older than me and a cousin I used to see a lot who was 6 years older. Well, they were heavy into the 60's music scene. My uncle came within a hair of taking me to Woodstock, but my mother started freaking out when she saw the news reports the day before that things were already getting out of hand, so I was staying put. I remember I couldn't wait for him to get home so I could hear everything, but he kind of slept for a couple of days to recover from swimming in mud and the drugs and all that scene. These two relatives were a profound influence, I was listening to amazing music at rock and roll's renaissance. I mean, my cousin bought me the second LP by The Band for the holidays in 1969 and I was just so amazed by the sound. Same thing when I heard the first Blood Sweat And Tears album, the masterpiece by Al Kooper. I was a pretty strange 13 year old by then, had all The Doors LP's as they came out, Chambers Brothers, even the Mothers Of Invention. It is the only LP my mother ever made me take back to the store, "We're Only In It For The Money." That's the cover with Zappa and the rest of the Mothers in dresses-"Is This Phase One Of Lumpy Gravy?" She also did not like me buying the Doors stuff as Jim Morrison was getting arrested, what seemed to have been every other week for one thing or another. Conservative catholic household was seeing a bit of anarchy there. I mean, we lived with my grandfather and he was from Sicily, pure old world, still praying to statues and the like.

Anyway, in 1971 when I was 15, I attended my first concert and what a show to pick, the Concert For Bangladesh at Madison Square Garden, the afternoon show. I was right next to the stage in the first row of the blue seats and the energy was insane. I believe the building might have actually levitated. And it cost me a whopping $4.50 for my ticket, to see George Harrison at his peak, Ringo, Clapton, Dylan, Billy Preston, Ravi Shankar, Badfinger and Leon Russell. At that exact time, I had been working in a used car lot on Saturdays, 8 hours of washing and waxing cars and being chased by bees and wasps for $10.00 for the day. When I had saved up the colossal amount of $30.00, I went to Woolworth's and bought a Brand X instrument, took off the nylon strings and put on steel ones, which eventually warped the guitar pretty good. I bought a Bob Dylan songbook with all the wrong chords in it and played constantly, though everything I did was basically wrong. I remember being flummoxed by bar chords, six dots and only five fingers, man was I contorting my fingers. Then I had the nerve to ask a kid at school who I knew played and was told, "You dope, that's a bar chord, one finger for three strings. " So then I started exploring the torture of those kinds of chords as the bridge came up by the day and the neck warped by the minute, but I think it helped strengthen my fingers.

I explored every kind of rock and roll as I learned, eventually got a better instrument and played all that early Allman Brothers stuff, Johnny Winter, Grateful Dead, etc... I did little else in my spare time as it was finally something of my own that I could excel in. I seemed to know early on that devotion and time was of major importance in excelling at anything, regardless of one's passions in life.

I was fortunate as well to have hooked up with some interesting people in my first year of high school, a friend of mine named Pat Conte who lived in Richmond Hill in Queens was also a Dylan guy and Zappa, etc.. but soon started exploring rural country blues on 78's. Pat has produced some amazing CD's of his own, The Secret Museum Of Mankind 5 CD series and Music Of Madagascar. He eventually wound up with over 10,000 78's of ethnic folk music from every corner of the globe, every nook and cranny too. All of it the purest folk music and instruments that had been around for centuries until music and commerce got their priorities all mixed up, much of the original music and instruments of this type are already being wiped out by the "progress" of the last century. He recently did an amazing job on the Yazoo Washington Phillips reissue, one of the finest CD's and some of the most amazing music to ever be heard or made by any human being. Astonishing stuff, really.

But back to the day, imagine a couple of 14 year olds sitting around listening to 78's. Yazoo and Biograph, among a few others, had been putting out wonderful blues LP's at this time and when I got my hands on the Young Big Bill Broonzy album, Charley Patton and Blind Lemon Jefferson, the rock and roll I had been growing up with immediately seemed a bit watered down and less organic. So I became a blues nut and then one day at work in 1975, I heard Danny Stiles On Your Dials radio show and he was featuring the music of Django Reinhardt all day. I lost my mind, a complete epiphany, and bolted for Sam Goody after work and bought the only 2 two Django LP's they had. I now have every recording he ever made on 20 double CD's, the amazing Integrale series out of France, almost 800 sides. I eventually visited his grave in Samois, France and took pictures back for Les Paul. He had paid for the headstone, but never saw it until that time. This was in 1988. Les asked me to call him at home and he actually read to me a record of every phone call and meeting he ever had with Django, every single date was recorded by him. Les told me he was buried in some place called Samois and if I could get him some pictures he would be so happy, so that was that. That shows you what Django meant to him, they were very dear friends. Because of being exposed to Django, I forgot about most of what I was listening to at that time and looked in the vintage jazz and instrumental record bins. One day, there it was, the Yazoo Roy Smeck LP with the Robert Crumb cover. I had never heard of Roy, but made a bee line to the cashier and went home with my new treasure. This was in 1975.

UkeTalk: What are the main ukes that you presently play?

Vincent: I have two Martins and two Roy Smeck Harmony ukes and that is it, all sopranos. Roy sold me his rather dark Mahogany uke and gave me one of the Harmony ukes, the others came my way over the past couple of years as reinforcements. I am not an instrument collector by any means. Some people seem to think I may have the uke Roy used in the Vitaphone picture in 1926, but there is, of course, no way to ever know. It is very dark like that one, same crown and all that, but that's a 50/50 guess and really doesn't matter much as it was still his and I have played it for 25 years now.

UkeTalk: Do you have any rare or unusual ukuleles in your collection?

Vincent: Yes, the Martin from Roy. Neither one of my Harmony Smeck ukes have that plastic fretboard, and one is much darker than the other, seem to both be early prototypes of one kind or another. But the plastic fretboard ukes are surprisingly playable anyway and beat a lot of the new laminated, heavy topped ukes out there that can't project. I had one of those Lanikai koa sopranos and sold it as soon as I got it. A great torture device, but a piece of junk for the dough. Also played one of the newer Martin ukes and wish I could have removed the name from the headstock, for the money and pedigree, pure garbage. I am hearing they are improving them now, the one I played was one of the purely and poorly Mexican made ones, but no volume, just dead and ridiculous to play. It was shameless for Martin to put that out, one of the major lapses in judgement. I always say if anyone wants a good soprano, get an older Martin on eBay.

UkeTalk: Do you stick to the soprano uke, or do you mix it up a bit?

Vincent: I only ever play a soprano. A student or two have concerts, which are nice for C6th, perfect for it actually, and for crooning as well. But a soprano should never be tuned to C6th in my mind, D6th is it's domain, a concert has that larger, deeper body for the lower tuning and deeper tone. A soprano is an attacking, projecting instrument, bright and loud, at least it should be. It only makes physical sense. I have no feelings about a tenor uke and I don't even know why baritone ukes exist, except for Arthur Godfrey's influence.

UkeTalk: Are there any Vincent Cortese recordings available commercially?

Vincent: No, though there are some sloppy and ancient multitracks on that www.ezfolk.com site in the MP3 section. I did record a 14 track CD last summer at home just to see if I could do it, you know, this digital stuff is a drag compared to tape, but it came out OK, played 9 instruments and sang on it, truly frightening. I give it to people who want it. If they don't like it, they can use them for coasters or targets for skeet shooting circus midgets. If I live long enough, I may put one out someday for the 10 people who might buy it, otherwise I may not be so inclined.

UkeTalk: Are there any current uke players out there today that you're listening to?

Vincent: Yes, one-Janet Klein. She is the real deal. If anyone questions this, just listen to her first CD, which is fantastic, she plays uke all over it. People might not consider her a virtuoso, but she has hot syncopation flying all over, all the sense of dynamics and nuance she will ever need right there. And what a singer and artist. But she is a bonafide musician as well, make no mistake. I think she deserves a ton of respect and kudos. She really can't be beat. The next 4 discs are all sublime and her Parlor Boys are all world class players without exception. There is a ton of attention to detail within these CD's from the gatefold artwork to the engineering and production, they seem to get an amazingly warm analog sound out of an often brittle digital technology. "Living In Sin" is one of my all time favorite records by anyone. I am not much for anyone playing jazz chord solos on a tenor uke or using electronic gimmicks on it either. Do it on guitar and you are just another jazz player or rodeo clown, but doing it on uke with flash and speed, well, I don't know.

Everybody tries to homogenize things, playing tenor guitars or banjos and tuning them like ukes and all that stuff. I think we lose too much of what the instrument was originally intended to be when we turn it into something else. Years ago, I went to see Pat Metheny and through the whole show, the guitar sounded like everything but a guitar. Hated it, thought it was absurd. What is the point of playing Hendrix on a tenor uke with distortion or effects? Do it on guitar and no one will notice you.

UkeTalk: Are you performing publicly?

Vincent: No, I was recently banned from the Olympic games for singing "Viva Las Vegas" on my soprano without wearing my Elvis jumpsuit, that was a no-no I was not aware of, especially in this town!!! You know, I once met Doc Pomus, the writer of that song and he may have cast some sort of spell on me for doing such an injustice to his poetic tome.

UkeTalk: Do you write music on the ukulele?

Vincent: No, I only play the uke for therapy, like a physical workout a lot of the time. I love it and always will, but it is still a bit of a novelty to me and one can only take it so far as a serious musical instrument, even when I am playing "Humoresque" or "Tiger Rag" on it or Roy's "Magic Ukulele Waltz", which are all about as complex as one is going to get on the soprano, plain and simple. At the same time, it has light years more musical potential than most people can comprehend.

UkeTalk: Here's a loaded question, since this is a uke-oriented conversation: Do you consider the uke your main instrument?

Vincent: No, the guitar is always first, uke second, then I get it mixed up between tenor banjo and lap steel. The tenor banjo is starting to bother me though, it is so loud and bright I can hardly stand it. I am still immersing myself in Django guitar playing, Les Paul, even some Joe Pass and Tal Farlow, not that I have conquered any of that with any degree of worthiness, but one must keep the carrot in front of the mule. I also still play and croon a gang of blues, a lot of slide, whatever I happen to be in the mood for and for however my guitar is tuned at a specific moment. One does get lazy as time goes by. But I pick up the uke just about every day, for at least a few minutes, we all know how accessible the soprano is. I am crazy about Cliff Edwards and that whole genre, so I enjoy that very much. And I am always maintaining and working on all my Roy Smeck stuff, techniques, solos and having a ton of fun with that.

UkeTalk: Living in Las Vegas, Vincent, do you find much of a uke scene there?

Vincent: No, nothing I have seen in 13 years here, most people here wouldn't know a uke from a mandola, they are too busy being drugged by prime time TV, a bizarrely corrupt political infrastructure, smoking, drinking, drugs, tattoos, scarecrow conversations on their cell phones, hustling or being hustled in one way or another and, of course, gambling, among other assorted degenerate activities. A very transient place in every way and the best and brightest don't exactly come here to stay or make any kind of impact on anything. I do have a great pal named Milan who comes by and he has developed an outstanding style on the soprano, beautiful picking, very musical, though he does it in the dastardly C6th tuning for crooning purposes, he makes it work. He finds great old Martin sopranos on eBay, repairs them fantastically well when necessary and brings them over. I marvel at them, they are all magnificent ukes. Beyond that, there is no real culture of any kind in Las Vegas, you need to fall into a vat of yogurt to get any real culture here. The mountains are gorgeous, the surrounding areas are like being on Mars, where a lot of people think I come from anyway, so it kind of works in it's way for me. I never back away from the surreal, it is more my reality anyway. Like Bob Dylan used to say, "I accept chaos, I am not sure it accepts me." Bottom line for me, I am here for my wife's health, you know, titanium rods in her spine and paraplegia are not real nice to deal with in damp or cold climates. For me, I could not be in a worse place for my music, but sometimes there is a bigger picture. No complaints in any way from me. She is the truest and rarest of gems.

UkeTalk: Are you available for ukulele lessons, either in person or by other forms of correspondence?

Vincent: Yes, I am, have a great student just starting out and having a blast, doing a great job getting through "Five Foot Two" and "Stars And Stripes" is next!!!! I don't want to take this stuff to the grave, I even offered people free tips and pointers on the Bulletin Board at Beloff's site, no takers though, which is kind of funny, but maybe should not be unexpected. I want to share whatever it is I am capable of sharing.

UkeTalk: How did you first become acquainted with Roy Smeck?

Vincent: Well, I had the Yazoo LP since 1975. I played in a kind of swing jazz trio with a great guitar player Tom O'Keefe and a great bass player named Bob Guida. Bob hooked up with a couple of electric blues guys, basically what became the house band at Tramps, a dive on East 15th Street that featured all the Chicago guys, etc. who would be brought to New York for a gig or two and would play with the local white pick up band. This is how I met Big Walter Horton, Blind John Davis, Otis Rush, Left Hand Frank, Johnny Copeland and who remembers who else....

You have to remember a couple of things, I was smart enough to stay single until I was 36 and could be out and about anywhere and anytime. Also, at that time, a lot of great ones were still alive and still quite musically vibrant. There were some fine blues and jazz spots and all of a sudden, you would be at a table with this one or that one, who was sitting next to you, etc. and almost all were very approachable, especially if you shared their passion and had a clue about what you were talking about and what they were about. I am one lucky guy, no doubt, but in this way, I was able to meet and converse with people like Les Paul, Herb Ellis, Zoot Sims, Cleanhead Vinson, Levon Helm, Rick Danko, Al Kooper, John Hammond, Paul Simon, Tal Farlow, Larry Adler, Johnny Winter, Stephane Grappelli, Muddy Waters, and so many more it's not worth going on. One night I'm sitting in Michael's Pub, there early with my girlfriend, no one in the room but us and the trout on my plate and in walked Joe Venuti. I said, "Hiya, Joe" and he says, "Hi young feller" in that amazing voice of his, he pulls up a chair and sits with us for 20 minutes. What could be better than that? Another night at Tramps, I am buying a Heineken for Big Walter because he was upset that he not only had to sleep in some sleazed out room above the bar, but had to play 3 sets when he was told 2 sets and next thing I know I am at a table with Doc Pomus, Johnny Winter, Jon Paris and Blondie Chaplin, the guy who sang "Sail On Sailor" with the Beach Boys and also played a lot with Rick Danko and Paul Butterfield and now sings backup with the Rolling Stones. Ah, show biz.... This was 1981.

In April of 1981, Bob called and asked if I wanted to go to the Eagle Tavern on 14th Street with him. He was playing bass behind some guy named Ian Buchanan. I said sure. I did not know who Ian was, but he was in a wheelchair and on pain killers from a failed suicide attempt by jumping out a window. It was later I learned he was a Reverend Gary Davis student, a guy who John Hammond and Jorma Kaukonen looked up to and Jorma says to this day Ian was the best of the lot. Anyway, that night Bob says, "Hey, Vin, this guy is a student of Smeck," referring to someone he was talking with. I was freaked out and asked if he thought Roy might want a guitar student. He gave me Roy's number, told me to call Roy and told me he would tell Roy I would be calling, which, of course, he never did. This is in my book and is a bit amusing, though it sure made me sweat when I first called Roy and he didn't know me from Curly Q. Link. Sadly, Bob called me not long after that, a year or two, I don't remember. He asked, "Do you remember Ian?" and he told me he jumped out the window again, but this time he made sure he fell on his head.

UkeTalk: What was a typical lesson with Roy Smeck like?

Vincent: They were all incredible on one level or another. I mean, once he saw you put your heart and soul into it, it was a double-edged thing. He was always amazed to see any real progress and then would push even harder. He laid it all out there for me, it was up to me to work. Mostly, we just sat in two folding chairs facing one another and I had to watch him and repeat what he did, ask him to explain what I could not grasp, which was almost everything in the beginning.

Remember, people like Roy, Les Paul, Django, Blind Lemon Jefferson, it did not exist before them, they invented it in all their respective ways. There were no books or records or DVD's or really any records of what they heard in their heads. They had to create it, genres of playing and thought. Eddie Lang, his guitar was strung in such a way with high action, the high E was an incredible .015 and the low E an even crazier .075. It is hard to imagine. And the B string was a wound string back then!!! All for volume and projection. These were mainly acoustic players who had to project and compete with an awful lot just to be heard. Dynamics and tone were everything to these people of pure genius. This is what Roy showed me as well. When teaching me a version of "Rachmaninoff's Prelude" on guitar, I could barely get my fingers where they needed to be and he was telling me to hit a bass note like a piano, boom!!! "Or else it's just a bunch of notes.!!!!!!!" That is why a teacher is such a great thing to have. On uke, he was a constant optical illusion, his right hand was just impossible to follow. He did break it down for me after some cajoling, but you were on your own a lot, he wanted you to practice. I had to call him or he would call me, just to say hi, every day for over ten years. The first words out of his mouth were always, "Are you practicing?" You learned fast never to say you were not practicing!!

UkeTalk: There seem to be more Roy Smeck students popping up here and there. Joel Eckhaus, of course, and Spats White; did you know any of them back in the day, or have you become familiar with them since? Or are there other currently recognized players that learned from Roy?

Vincent: No, though I am still great pals with Alan Edelstein who did the documentary on Roy that was nominated for an Oscar. Never met Spats, met Joel a couple of times. He was with Roy for two years, but he really seems to have successfully detoured his energies into his uke building over the years. I was with Roy for ten years, every week for an hour or two a week and all I cared about was playing, so I practiced 5-7 hours a day on uke, guitar, tenor banjo and Hawaiian lap steel. All I wanted to do was learn all I could in whatever time I had with Roy. Don't forget, he was 81 when I met him, so who knew he would last another 13 years.

UkeTalk: In 2004, you published a book entitled "Roy Smeck: The Wizard of the Strings in his Life and Times". I believe your book is the only biography available on Roy Smeck; is this true?

Vincent: Yes, which is why I wrote it, somebody had to!!! While there are ukulele people in high and low places who don't know or seem to care about the likes of Roy Smeck or Cliff Edwards, I can tell you a great story. In 1991, a friend of mine in England ran into George Harrison at a mutual friend's house. I had met this friend of mine, Andrew Palmer back in 1988 in England, he then of the Ukulele Society Of Great Britain. Anyway, so he hangs out with George and actor Jimmy Nail and their mutual acquaintances and George is playing his Ludwig banjo uke and trying to remember the lyrics to the songs he is about to play on his tour of Japan with Eric Clapton. George was really concerned with this, but they sat around playing Beatles songs and old classics on ukes all day. My friend Andrew showed George a photograph of Roy and myself that had just been published in a newsletter magazine type thing over there. And George was freaked out and asked Andrew if there was any way he could set up some interviews with Roy as George was, at that time, doing a book on the history of the ukulele that, alas, never came to fruition. So Andrew called me and asked if I would set up an interview and George did send two people over to interview Roy for two sessions. Roy was not in good shape at that time, so I don't know what they may have gotten out of him, but it happened. And Andrew told me that George thanked me and sent me his alias so I could send George some Roy Smeck tapes on uke and lap steel that would bypass his staff and go to him directly, which he also thanked me for through Andrew. Never had any direct contact with George, that would have really been the icing on the cake, but he saw my picture with Roy and received my letters and tapes and it seemed to not have any adverse effects on him. I also received four great photos for my efforts, taken that day with George standing in the middle, happily playing his Ludwig Banjo uke. These pictures were for my eyes only and that is how they have remained out of respect. I am very fortunate to have them. My friend Andrew got a call at home from George soon after that and they met up at a George Formby meeting, George showed up with Derek Taylor and they officially joined and sat around singing great George Formby songs into the wee hours.

UkeTalk: When did you decide that you would write the Roy Smeck biography?

Vincent: A couple of years before it came out. A lot had happened, a lot of personal loss and all that and my friendship with Roy was so unique. He deserved a book long before my effort came about. It was to hold him up before the world, a labor of love for a true friend and mentor who deserves a hell of a lot more respect and attention than he gets. Kind of like Lonnie Johnson. What an amazing musician and world class guitarist. Due to a chance meeting, I was talking with B.B. King about Lonnie a year or so ago for a good long time. B.B. finally met Lonnie up in Toronto around 1969, not long before Lonnie was killed. A true highlight in his life, he was very moved talking about Lonnie. Anyone who has ever read any interviews with him, he takes every chance to extol the virtues of Lonnie Johnson, Django, Lemon and Charlie Christian. I am with him all the way in every instance. An amusing aside, I gave B.B. one of my business cards and offered him a free lifetime supply of ukulele lessons. You should have seen the expression on his face!!!. Before we left, he said to my wife, "Keep him away from that banjo!! Tell him the guitar is the thing!!!"

UkeTalk: Vincent, here's kind of a musical fantasy question: If the Music Police searched your house, what recordings might they discover at the Vincent Cortese home that would surprise us?

Vincent: Well, who knows, there is so much from Jolson to Judy Garland, Blind Blake, The Band, The Beatles, Cliff Edwards, Eddie Lang & Joe Venuti, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Janet Klein, Ella Fitzgerald, Django, Grappelli. Bireli Lagrene, Joe Pass, Oscar Aleman, Tal Farlow, Les Paul and Mary Ford, Charlie Christian, Washington Phillips, Howlin' Wolf, Little Walter, the Otis Brothers, on and on.............

This has been fun for me, hope I haven't bored anyone into a coma. If so, stir yourself, get out your uke and kick that gong around!!

Anyone who wants to contact me, you can write to me at MEWZIKALGUY@AOL.COM

"Roy Smeck: The Wizard of the Strings in his Life and Times"   by Vincent Cortese is available through many bookstores. You may purchase it on-line through Elderly Instruments. You may also purchase it on-line in a PDF format at eBooks.