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Biography Domino first attracted national attention with "The Fat Man" (1949, Imperial Records), credited by some as being the first rock and roll record, featuring a rolling piano and Domino doing wah-wah vocalizing over a fat back beat. The record, a reworking of "Junker's Blues" by Champion Jack Dupree, was a massive hit, selling over a million copies and peaking at Domino then released a series of hit songs with producer and co-writer Dave Bartholomew, saxophonist Alvin "Red" Tyler and drummer Earl Palmer. Other notable and long-standing musicians in Domino's band were saxophonists Reggie Houston, Lee Allen, and Fred Kemp who was also Domino's trusted bandleader. Domino finally crossed into the pop mainstream with "Ain't That a Shame" (1955) which hit the Top Ten, though Pat Boone characteristically hit His 1956 uptempo version of the old song "Blueberry Hill", reached Fats appeared in two films released in 1956: Shake, Rattle & Rock!• and The Girl Can't Help It.• On 18 December 1957, Domino's hit "The Big Beat" was featured on Dick Clark's American Bandstand. Domino continued to have a steady series of hits for Imperial through early 1962. Twenty-two of his Imperial singles were double-sided hits -- that is, both the A-side and the B-side of the single charted (i.e., 44 songs). After he moved to ABC-Paramount in 1963, however, Domino's chart career was drastically curtailed. He managed one top 40 hit for ABC (1963's "Red Sails In The Sunset"), but by the end of 1964 the British Invasion had changed the tastes of the record-buying public, and Domino's chart run was over. Despite the lack of chart success, Domino continued to record steadily until about 1970, and sporadically after that. He also continued as a popular live act for several decades. He was furthermore acknowledged as an important influence on the music of the sixties and seventies by some of the top artists of that era; Beatles song "Lady Madonna" was reportedly written by Paul McCartney in an emulation of Domino's style. Domino did manage to return to the "Hot 100" charts one last time in 1968. Ironically, it was with a cover of The Beatles' "Lady Madonna", which appeared at exactly In the 1980s, Domino decided he would no longer leave New Orleans, having a comfortable income from royalties and a dislike for touring, and claiming he could not get any food that he liked anyplace else. His induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and an invitation to perform at the White House failed to get Domino to make an exception to this policy. He lived in a mansion in a predominantly working-class Lower 9th Ward neighborhood, where he was a familiar sight in his bright pink Cadillac. He makes yearly appearances at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival and other local events. When Hurricane Katrina was approaching New Orleans in August 2005, Domino chose to stay at home with his family, due to his wife's poor health. His house, located in New Orleans’ Lower 9th Ward, was in an area that was heavily flooded. He was thought to be dead, with someone spray-painting a message on his home, "RIP Fats. You will be missed," which was shown in news photos. On September 1, Domino's agent Al Embry announced that he had not heard from the musician since before the hurricane had struck. Later that day, CNN reported that Domino was rescued by a United States Coast Guard helicopter. His daughter, gospel singer Karen Domino White, identified him from a photo shown on CNN. The Domino family was then taken to a Baton Rouge shelter, after which they were picked up by JaMarcus Russell, the starting quarterback of the Louisiana State University football team, and Fats' granddaughter's boyfriend. He let the Dominos stay in his apartment. The Washington Post reported that that on Friday, September 2, the Dominos had left Russell's apartment after sleeping three nights on the couch. "We've lost everything," Domino said, according to the Post story.• By January 2006, work to gut and repair Domino's Lower 9th Ward home and office had begun. Domino was the first artist to be announced as scheduled to perform at the 2006 Jazz & Heritage Festival, although he was too ill to perform and was only able to offer the audience an on-stage greeting. Domino also released an album Alive and Kickin in early 2006 to benefit the Tipitina Foundation, which supports indigent local musicians. The title song was recorded after Katrina, but most of the cuts were from unreleased sessions in the 1990s. Business His career has been produced and managed since the 1980s by multimedia entertainment purveyor and music producer Robert G. Vernon. During Vernon's tenure, Domino's earnings have increased 500%. Since 1995, Vernon and Domino have been partners (with many other companies, such as Dick Clark Productions) in the Bobkat Music Trust. Bobkat Music is an entertainment group that manages the careers (some posthumous) of Fats Domino, Randy Pringle (writer), and others. Trivia Singles discography Nationally charted hits shown in bold. (Virtually all of Domino's singles of the 1950s and 60s charted regionally in the US south, especially in New Orleans.) Notes Further reading | ||||||||||
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