Learn - Play Bongos - Jack Costanzo

 

Learn - Play Bongos

Learn - Play Bongos
With "Mr. Bongo" Jack Costanzo

Producer: Felix Slatkin
Engineer: Henry Lewy

Cover Design: Pate/Francis & Associates
Photography: Garrett-Howard, Inc.
Liberty Records LRP 3177
1961

From the back cover: JACK COSTANZO HAS TAUGHT: Marlon Brando, Gary Cooper, Carolyn Jones,Hugh O'Brian, June Allyson, Ricardo Montalban, Harry James and many other celebrities from the entertainment world.

HAS BEEN FEATURED WITH: Stan Kenton, Nat "King" Cole, Ray Anthony, Harry James, Nelson Riddle, Billy May, Les Baxter and other top orchestras.

The country's leading bongo player, Jack Costanzo is, more than any other individual, responsible for the bongo's acceptance and great popularity in the United States.

A native of Chicago, Jack showed an early obsession with rhythm. Knives and forks became drumsticks and any reasonably flat surface saw duty as a drumhead. The rhythm also showed up in his feet and Jack found himself a teacher of ballroom dancing at the age of fourteen! It was while dancing to an imported Puerto Rican rhumba band that Jack discovered the bongos. Undismayed by the fact that he could not find bongos in this country, he made his own! Then followed hours of practice and experimenting on this instrument about which little was known and less written.

After his enlistment and subsequent release from the service, Jack continued his dancing, teaching and practicing on the bongos. His first job for pay as a bongo player was with the Bobby Ramos orchestra at the famed Trocadero nightclub in Hollywood. Not long after that he joined Stan Kenton and began making bongo history. Many of Jack's recordings with the Kenton ork are now classics in bongo playing. Bongos became known as an instrument and Costanzo emerged as its leading exponent.

Then, becoming the fourth man in the Nat "King" Cole "trio," Jack further broadened the scope of bongos. More great recordings were forthcoming.

Since that time, Jack has been associated with most of the great names in the entertainment world. For the past several years he has had a successful orchestra of his own. Through his efforts the bongos are now accepted as an exciting musical instrument and are enjoying immense popularity.

Who but "Mr. Bongo" should undertake to teach the instrument he has mastered so perfectly?

IRA COOK – Narrator, is one of Los Angeles' leading personality disk jockeys, holding forth daily on Radio Station KMPC. His very popular show is frequently broadcast world-wide under the auspices of the Armed Forces Radio Network.

Introduction - I Got A Bongo (Excerpt)
El Diablito (Excerpt) - Instruction
El Diablito (Play Along)
Peanut Vendor (Play Along) ("El Manisero")
Somethin' Else (Play Along)
Something Else (Excerp) - Instruction / Three Steps To Heaven (Excerpt) - Instruction
Three Steps To Heaven (Play Along)
Go Bongo - Instruction
Instruction
Bei Mir Bist Du Schon (Play Along)
Dickey, Dickey, Dickey, Dockey