Beginnings . . .


Soon after 7-year-old Antonino Lo Tempio of Niagara Falls, New York found out that his parents had not actually found him abandoned in the garbage, (as his sister, Carol, had repeatedly insisted) he made his initial foray into the limelight.  Nino recalls: "I sang with Benny Goodman when I was a little kid.  Peggy Lee had just finished singing.  I walked on the stage, tugged at his coat, and said `Mr. Goodman, my grandfather said I could have 10 dollars if I could sing with your band.´ Well, he looked at the audience and said `Folks, this is not planned,´ which it wasn´t.  So he picked me up and said `What are you going to sing?´, and I said `Rosetta in the key of C with a tag at the end´, and TORE `EM UP!"  At Goodman's request, little Nino returned to Shea´s Buffalo Theatre in Buffalo, New York for the next six nights to encore his show-stopper.  This was the debut performance in a career that would span over 60 years.  And his sister didn't do too badly either.

     


9-Year-Old Nino on the set of "George White Scandals of 1945"