R.I.P. Sam Butera Arranger of "Just a Gigolo" and Sax Player for Louis Prima

http://blog.nola.com/keithspera/2009/06/sam_butera_former_louis_prima.html

From Keith Spera's obit

the hard-driving, hard-swinging New Orleans saxophonist who was Louis Prima's longtime musical partner, died Wednesday in Las Vegas following a long illness. He was 81.

Mr. Butera joined Prima's band in 1954. With singer Keely Smith, they built one of the most popular acts in the golden age of Las Vegas. Mr. Butera cooked up the arrangements that gave the likes of "Just a Gigolo," "I Ain't Got Nobody" and "Jump Jive An' Wail" maximum impact.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LEwiLUF_pcs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHK3_bZywE4&feature=related

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=COH7I9R8jl8&NR=1

"Louis's ace-in-the-hole was Sam Butera," said Gia Prima, the fifth of Louis's five wives and the singer in his band from 1962 to 1975. "That animal attraction that they had, with Sam's honking sax and Louis's jumping and jiving -- without Sam, Louis couldn't have pulled it off."

Mr. Butera grew up in the 7th Ward. His father owned Poor Boys Grocery & Meat Market. One evening the elder Butera took his son to see a big band, and asked the boy which horn he liked the best.

"The saxophones were closest, so I pointed to the saxophones," Mr. Butera recalled in a 1996 interview. "The next day I had a horn."

A prodigy, he turned pro at 14, serving as the human jukebox for strippers on Bourbon Street. "I worked at every joint on that street," he recounted. "You name it and I worked it. All those girls wanted to do was mother me."

He supposedly was unhappy at one point that David Lee Roth never acknowledged that he was using Sam's arrangement on "Just a Gigolo."

Alex Harvey also copped that medley seven years before David Lee, on "The Mafia Stole My Guitar" LP.

I saw Butera perform in 2003 when he was back in New Orleans. He was still putting on a hard-swinging show well into his 70s.