Dick Contino - Accordion Magic! (1964 Hamilton LP)

The best things in life are free! OK, not really, but they are found in the 50-cent bin at Hymie's Vintage Records in Minneapolis. This jazzy album features the famous (at least in the circles of accordion fans, not that I associate myself with any of those weirdos!) freestyle accordionist Dick Contino (1930-2017) playing at his best. On this album, there are such standards as "Dark Eyes" and "She's Funny That Way". But then, Contino goes for broke with bizarrely-effective versions of such peculiarities as "The Flight of the Bumblebee" and even "Hava Nagila"!

This, friends, is what record collecting is all about, and why this particular album is a great choice for the oh-so-coveted spot of first post here on The Retro Echo. I have had my copy of this album since I picked it up as a nine-year-old, and it was actually one of the first (if not, the first) record I ever bought with my own money at the start of the 2000s. I can only imagine now as an adult what Auralee Likes, Hymie's lead cashier at the time, must have thought of me as I eagerly walked up to her with this record in hand, ready to check out!

Just because this album doesn't neatly fit into the genres of Blues, Jazz, Third Stream, Classical or Pop doesn't mean that Contino's chops aren't blisteringly hot, though! At the tender age of 17, he had already won First Prize in a Fresno, California talent show that was broadcast over national radio and was sponsored by none other than bandleader Horace Heidt (1901-1986)! At one point in the late 1940s, he was even being billed as "The Best Accordion Player of the World", appearing on the Ed Sullivan Show a record 48 times!

However, the reason you've likely never heard of him (unless you're a member of the accordion community, which again, automatically makes you a weirdo) is that he was drafted during the Korean War, and decided to ignore the summons. As a result, he was arrested and imprisoned for nearly a year on the charge of draft evasion. While I have my own opinion on whether or not that was the right thing for him to do, the 1950s American public decidedly reacted against him when word got out of what he had done. Despite receiving a Presidential pardon, his career took a nosedive that did not begin to recover until the early 1990s, when Daddy-O, a fly-by-night 1958 film in which he played a lead role as a beatnik rebel and singer, became the plot centerpiece of an episode of Mystery Science Theatre 3000. This gave him exposure to a new generation of accordion weirdos fans and once again, gave him back the musical spotlight that his talent was deserving of the first time around.

This album also features piano, percussion, bass and trumpet, their performers all par excellence, yet regrettably uncredited on the album. However, considering that Contino was still living in California at the time this album was recorded, it is not unreasonable to think that all the remaining musicians featured on this album were studio musicians from the Fresno area. To the best of my knowledge, this LP has never been re-released, so until further information comes along, their identities will remain a mystery.

Here are two YouTube samples of Contino's playing on this album:

  The songs on this album are as follows:

1. "Blues In F"
2. "Cool Water"
3. "Dark Eyes"
4. "Fascination"
5. "Hava Nagila"
6. "I Almost Lost My Mind"
7. "I Wonder, I Wonder, I Wonder"
8. "I'm Beginning To See The Light"
9. "Sentimental Me"
10. "She's Funny That Way"
11. "The Flight Of The Bumblebee"
12. "Till I Waltz Again With You"

Download (30.1 MB, 128 kbps)