Before long, Domino was leading his own band and drawing crowds to the Hideaway. He emulated such pianists as barrelhouse master Meade Lux Lewis, jazz great Count Basie and New Orleans’ own Professor Longhair, and he embraced the new sounds of rhythm and blues, led by Louis Jordan, Roy Milton, Big Joe Turner and other singers. One of them, at a bedspring factory, nearly ended his career before it started when he cut his hand so badly that the doctor who examined him advised amputation.ĭomino declined, and at 18 he was a member of Billy Diamond’s band playing the Hideaway club. ![]() The youngster was performing in public by age 10, and at 14 he quit school to work at a variety of jobs. ![]() It was a poor family, and a musical one, and Antoine learned piano from a brother-in-law, Dixieland musician Harrison Verret. “Something that old people or the kids could both enjoy.”Īntoine Domino Jr. “I was lucky enough to write songs that carry a good beat and tell a real story that people could feel was their story too,” Domino told The Times in 1985. He married Rose Mary Hall in 1948 and they had eight children with their father’s initial in common: Antoinette, Antoine III, Andrea, Anatole, Anola, Adonica, Antonio and Andre. Despite his hectic schedule of touring and recording, he remained rooted in his childhood neighborhood, where he enjoyed cooking Louisiana dishes, cracking a bottle of beer and spending time with his family. His ambitions were modest, his life unassuming. Humble and soft-spoken, he projected a docile, amiable image, smiling cherubically and flashing his bulky diamond rings as he played. Unlike Lewis, Little Richard and Berry, Domino was no cultural renegade.
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