NEW ORLEANS FESTIVALS - Jazz Fest Features

Fats Domino

After selling 65 million records, in his heyday alone, and gaining international fame as one of the architects of rock and roll, Antoine Fats Domino is still a homebody.

"I live 18 blocks from the home where I was born." Domino says. "I guess I could have lived anywhere but I like New Orleans."

Domino lives in the modest neighborhood where he grew up and where he got his start. From his brother-in-law, who played banjo in Papa Celestin's Dixieland Jazz Band, Domino picked up some piano lessons. He soon found it easy to learn music by ear but never really thought about becoming a musician. But his talents seeped out on the job, as he delivered ice in his neighborhood.

"Everybody used to have a stand-up piano in their house," he says. "If I saw one I would play a note or two." He was much closer than he thought to a career as a musician. At 21 years old, he was making bed frames for a company on Broad Street while three nights a week he played piano at the Hideaway club in the lower Ninth Ward, along the river. Professor Longhair and other local musicians inspired Domino, though at the time he only played music he learned from records or from others.

At first, Domino had no interest in touring but eventually Bartholomew convinced him. They traveled the world and everywhere they went people knew his hits. But he kept his home in New Orleans and shied away from the trappings of his fame. When President Bill Clinton invited him to the White House to accept a National Medal of Arts award, Domino declined.

Whatever he played, his rollicking barrelhouse style drew crowds, and also Dave Bartholomew, who had been hired by Imperial Records to find talent. He convinced Domino to come to a recording studio. At Cosimo Matassa's legendary J&M Studio, they cut eight songs during their first session. One of them, The Fat Man, went on to sell a million copies, though Domino took it all in stride.

"I just liked to do what I was doing when I made my first record."

Domino and Bartholomew entered into a very productive partnership in the studio. They sent more than 40 hits to the top of the Billboard charts. Seven hit number one, including Ain't That A Shame, Blueberry Hill, Blue Monday, I'm Ready, I'm Walking, I Want to Walk You Home and Walking To New Orleans. During the '50s, Domino sold more records and had more hits than anyone except Elvis Presley.

In spite of his privacy, he's still the same old Fats. Always impeccably dressed, including the heavy gold rings that were an early signature, he steps out to perform a couple of times a year. On stage, he's never lost his broad smile or his energetic style, pounding on the keys and playing his music the way he first recorded it.