Carmen Lombardo

Carmen Lombardo (* July 16, 1903 in London ( Ontario), † April 17, 1971 in Miami) was a Canadian songwriter, singer and saxophonist of light entertainment music. He was the younger brother of bandleader Guy Lombardo.

Lombardo had flute lessons and played flute and saxophone in the orchestra of his brother in Canada. With his brother he founded in 1923 Guy Lombardo and his Royal Canadians, in which he was musical director and saxophonist first on the alto saxophone. He also appeared as a singer on there, but sometimes with a vibrato of such sentimental effect that he was caricatured in the cartoons of Warner Brothers as Cryman Lombardo and also still in the 1960s by Tony Randall on The Tonight Show. He also composed for the Lombardo Orchestra. He wrote the band's hits such as Sweethearts on Parade (1928, with Johnny Green, Gus Kahn ), has topped the U.S. charts in 1929 three weeks ridin around in the Rain ( Gene Austin 1934), Coquette, Boo Hoo ( You got me crying for you ) ( 1937), Sailboat in the Moonlight (1937 ), Some Rainy Day, Get out Those old records. Singers such as Bing Crosby and Dean Martin took to his songs and Coquette was recorded by Louis Armstrong, Paul Whiteman, Jimmie Lunceford, Bob Crosby, Bud Freeman and The Ink Spots.

For the Royal Canadians, where he remained until 1970, he wrote with John Jacob Loeb stage shows Arabian Nights, Paradise Iceland and Mardi Gras!.

1937 and 1938 he won the Down Beat poll as a saxophonist in the category Sweet Music ( in the jazz magazine then ironically called corn ).