Friday, April 9, 2004 | 5:47 a.m.
WEEKEND EDITION
April 10 - 11, 2004
Vic Damone retired shortly after suffering a stroke on June 25, 2000, at his home in New Jersey -- the day after performing at a private function in Las Vegas.
The 75-year-old legend recovered fully from the stroke within a few months, but he says he took the episode as a sign it was time to call it a career.
About three years after his final concert (which was Feb. 10, 2001) Damone has announced he is almost ready to return to the stage. No firm date or location has been set, but he's eager for a comeback.
Damone says he isn't doing it for the money, but to preserve the songs of such legends as Cole Porter and George Gershwin, and to pass the appreciation for their music along to young people.
During a wide-ranging telephone interview with the Las Vegas Sun from his Florida residence, Damone discussed his health, his longtime connection with Las Vegas, his views on the latest music trends and his impending emergence from retirement.
Las Vegas Sun: First of all, tell us about the stroke. How did it come about?
Vic Damone: What happened was, I appeared at two private concerts at Harrah's in Las Vegas, one on June 23, 2000, and one on June 24. The day before I opened I had some bad food and got dysentery and became dehydrated. I wasn't drinking enough fluids.
On June 25, after I finished the two days in Vegas, I flew to my home in Margate, N.J. -- I was supposed to open at the Hilton in Atlantic City the next day, on June 26.
On the night of June 25, I had the stroke. It was because I was so dehydrated. My wife, Rena, got me to the hospital within 20 minutes.
Sun: Was your recovery process lengthy? Did you suffer any ill effects?
Damone: I came around pretty fast. I had a great trainer who worked with me three days a week. I'm in better shape now than before the stroke.
My next concert was on Feb. 10, 2001. And that was my last. I figured God was trying to tell me something. I had been performing since 1947. God was very good to me. I said, "That's it." I was going to go on tour, but I just decided to quit. I could have gone on, I sang as well as ever that particular night on Feb. 10. It was seven months after my stroke.
Sun: You've been associated with Las Vegas almost your entire career. When did that association begin?
Damone: The first time I worked there was on Nov. 1, 1949. The man who got me in was Milton Berle. He was really a great friend, backing me, introducing me. He heard me on the Arthur Godfrey show. I was working at the Macambo in Los Angeles. My next job was in Las Vegas at the Flamingo.
I worked the Flamingo many times. For the first four, five or six years that was my home. It was wonderful. I remember I used to borrow a .22 from a security guard and walk across the street into the desert and shoot rabbits.
Someone said I needed to buy some land there as an investment. I said, "No, it's too late."
Sun: How do you like Vegas today, compared to the old days?
Damone: I think it's gotten out of hand, but not necessarily in a bad way. I remember the days when guys like myself, Nat King Cole and Jerry Lewis, we would go out and deal blackjack if we wanted to. We'd just push the dealer out of the way and start dealing.
I love Vegas. It's great to have people there who have guided the town into building those beautiful hotels, people like Steve Wynn. He is one of the top guys. They should build a statue of him.
Sun: What's your opinion of today's music?
Damone: What bothers me -- on Super Bowl night I watched Janet Jackson and the music produced by MTV. They got rock or rap groups onstage and they kept scratching their crotch. This is not what it's all about. Today's entertainment is all a lot of smoke and whistles, and something has got to be done about this.
It has gotten to a point where younger artists get managers and agents so hungry for the buck, they forget about the people watching, and about how the performers can influence the kids. We have to better ourselves. When you see rappers onstage with their hats to the side and looking like they need a bath, going back and forth -- OK, they're from the streets, but so was I. You have to better yourself.
Tommy Dorsey and the others. They were always elegant, dressed magnificently. Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin -- when we went onstage, we were in a tuxedo.
Sun: Why are you considering a return to the stage?
Damone: After three years, I'm starting to get itchy. I keep looking and listening to all these people who claim to be singers. What I don't like is that younger people don't know the music by the Gershwins, Rodgers, all these wonderful writers and their great songs. Today people are listening to rap and stuff like that. The kids are missing out.
When I listen to Sinatra sing or to the Glenn Miller Band or to Count Basie, Ella Fitzgerald, Billy Eckstine -- all these wonderful singers, it's like it never happened. They're being forgotten. How can this be? The kids in America should know these artists.
Sun: What is your plan?
Damone: I've been talking to Steve (Lawrence) and Eydie (Gorme) about maybe coming back, about going to the colleges.
I'm thinking I should come back and do something to let the kids know that there is something finer, something better out there than rap. What maybe I should do is have a comeback, starting by visiting the colleges, take my quintet and go to the colleges and do seminars on Gershwin, Porter, Sammy Khan, Jimmy Dorsey. Maybe let the kids know that there is other music out there with more substance to it.
Steve and Eydie like the idea of visiting the colleges to educate the young people. The radio stations don't play our records anymore. They play monotonous music, always the same beat. The singers have no personality.
Sun: So you are serious about this?
Damone: Yes, but not because of me, as much as I love to sing, but something's got to be done to bring back the dignity that we had at one time, for music and for ourselves.
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