Artie Kane (born Aaron Cohen; April 14, 1929 – June 21, 2022)[1] was an American pianist, film score composer, and conductor with a career spanning over six decades.
In 1976, Kane was nominated for a Grammy Award along with Ralph Grierson[11] for a two-piano George Gershwin Album, 'S Wonderful on Angel Records.[12] He was inducted into the Columbus Senior Musicians Hall of Fame in 1998[13] and is a co-author of the book, Music to My Years: Love and Life Between the Notes.
Biography
Early life
Artie Kane playing Rhapsody in Blue for Holiday On Ice in 1954
Kane was born in Columbus, Ohio in 1929. His family was Jewish. His mother, Sarah Berman, emigrated from Belarus in 1914. His father, Nathan Cohen, whose family members were Russian musicians, immigrated to the United States from Russia. Nathan served two years in the U.S. Army in France during WWI. Kane's parents married in 1924 in Columbus. Kane's father died a week before his third birthday. He was raised by his mother and uncle, Joe Berman, whom Kane credited for inspiring him to become a musician.[14]
Kane took to the piano at the age of three[15] and was considered a child prodigy.[16] At four, he won first prize in a statewide contest, competing with children of seven and eight. At 10, he studied under Agnes Wright and went to New York once a year to play for Prof. Alexander Siloti, Rachmaninoff's teacher who advised Kane as to his next season's study.[17]
In 1944, Kane returned to Columbus and attended South High School, played in Snook Neal's band[20] and was hired by radio station WBNS where he played daily radio segments of classical piano, plus his own arrangements of popular music.[21]
In 1947 at eighteen years old, he was hired as a pianist in the band at Club Gloria in Columbus, Ohio with comedian Harry Jarkey.[22] From the radio work and write-ups in local newspapers, the conductor Izler Solomon invited Kane to play Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue for a Pops concert with the Columbus Philharmonic Orchestra.[23]
On October 19, 1948, Kane changed his name from Aaron Cohen to Artie Kane on the advice of Matt Gilbert, a cartoonist for The Cleveland Plain Dealer who suggested it as a more distinctive stage name. His mother Sarah Cohen also changed her name from Sarah B. Cohen to Sally B. Kane.
Holiday on Ice
In 1949, Artie Kane went to Toledo, Ohio, to audition as pianist for Holiday On Ice and was hired based on his reputation. He spent eight years on the road as rehearsal pianist and pianist/conductor for the company.[24]
From 1953 to 1956, Kane was the rehearsal and show pianist for Norwegian figure skater and Olympic medalist Sonja Henie during the European Holiday On Ice Tour.[25] He also appeared in NBC's first color television spectacular, Sonja Henie’s Holiday on Ice on December 22, 1956.[26]
New York
In 1956, Kane left the ice show and went to New York City working as a Broadway rehearsal and audition pianist and playing nightclubs. He was hired as pianist and assistant conductor at the Roxy Theatre, for the Roxy Orchestra under conductor Robert Boucher, playing and conducting four shows a day, seven days a week for two years.[27] His work is included on the Bob Boucher's orchestra LP record Sightseeing in Sound with a solo opening of ragtime piano.[28]
Prior to the Roxy's closing, Kane was offered a job as Jaye P. Morgan's on-the-road conductor and pianist. Kane conducted for her in night clubs, at personal appearances, and recording sessions and they lived together in the Upper East Side of New York City.[29]
Hollywood
Kane and Morgan married on July 31, 1960, and they settled in Los Angeles.[30] In Hollywood, he renewed an acquaintance with Dominic Frontiere, a composer in LA whom he had met in New York.[27] Frontiere, in turn, opened doors for him to join the musicians' Local 47 and hired him to play for the TV series The New Breed.[31] Frontiere also hired Kane throughout the sixties as he composed music for producer Leslie Stevens’ weekly television shows, including Outer Limits and Quinn Martin Productions’ The Fugitive.
In 1966, Nelson Riddle, the arranger and conductor for Frank Sinatra's future Billboard #1 and Grammy Award-winning album Strangers in the Night, asked Kane to play the Hammond organ on the album.[33] Nine months earlier as a studio pianist, Kane played a pop-rock organ on Nelson's score for a car-race film called Red Line 7000 and Nelson was looking for a similar sound for the Sinatra album. Eight months later in December, Kane appeared on the subsequent television special, A Man and His Music – Part II.[34]
In 1972, Kane was brought to RCA's attention by composer, conductor, and pianist Henry Mancini who was impressed by Kane's work with Ray Brown on bass and Shelly Manne on drums for Henry's film score, Me, Natalie. Later that year, Mancini personally produced and arranged the music for the trio called, Artie Kane Plays Organ![35]
In 1975, towards the end of his career as a session musician, Artie distinguished himself by joining with another respected session pianist, Ralph Grierson, to release a two-piano Gershwin album called 'S Wonderful. The album included rare, out-of-print and never-before-recorded songs published in the 1930s and '40s, as well as An American in Paris,Three Preludes, and six 'classic' Gershwin show tunes.[36] The album was nominated for a Grammy in 1976.[12]
For sixteen years Kane worked as a session keyboardist for Fox, MGM, Warner Music, and Universal on movies, television, film, and television variety shows before starting his composing career.
Composer
Artie Kane conducting a recording session at 20th Century Fox
With twelve years of training, playing piano for film scores, Kane decided to pursue a career as a film composer. Kane studied with teachers Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco, a faculty member and teacher of film music at the Los Angeles Conservatory of Music and Dr. Albert Harris.[27] Harris helped Kane refine his skills and in 1974, Kane was given a chance to compose and orchestrate the music for a horror film known by several titles: It Lives by Night, The Bat People, and It’s Alive.[37]
When producer Douglas S. Cramer became head of production at Spelling Productions, he took Kane with him. Kane rotated with other composers scoring Love Boat and Vegas for the Spelling lineup. While working on his first Love Boat assignment, Kane heard from a producer at Lorimar about scoring a movie-for-television directed by Robert Butler and starring Tuesday Weld titled A Question of Guilt in 1978.[39]
In 1980, when Kane finished scoring an action thriller film called, Night of the Juggler for Columbia Pictures, Richard Brooks, the director Kane worked for on Looking for Mr. Goodbar, asked him to score his new film, the comedy thriller Wrong is Right starring Katharine Ross and Sean Connery.
In 1987, after scoring a few episodes of crime drama Jake and the Fatman, Kane became one of a rotating group of composers on a popular spinoff show called Matlock, starring Andy Griffith.[5] Kane composed 56 episodes of the series over six years and won four BMI TV Music Awards for his work.
Between 1976 1990, Kane's television credits include the music for 31 episodes of the action series, Wonder Woman, 56 episodes of the sitcom Love Boat, 18 episodes of the soap opera Dynasty, ten episodes of the detective series Vega$, and 11 episodes of crime drama Wolf. His credits also include three two-hour Gunsmoke television movies, Gunsmoke: To the Last Man (1992), Gunsmoke: The Long Ride (1993), and Gunsmoke: One Man's Justice.
Conductor
In 1992, Kane received a surprise offer to conduct for composer Marc Shaiman on his scores for the films A Few Good Men and Sister Act which launched his third career as a conductor.
One of Kane's more memorable experiences as a conductor was in March 1993. He received a phone call from the conductor John Williams to stand in for him for a few sessions as conductor for the Steven Spielberg film, Jurassic Park. With little preparation and with Kane's friend and Williams' music editor Ken Wannberg, Kane sight-read the score and recorded it with a 106-piece orchestra.
Kane married eight times. His first marriage, in 1948, was to the dancer Joy Holly. He met Holly while touring with Harry Jarkey at the Wenona Beach Casino at Bay City, Michigan. The couple separated in 1950 and divorced on August 2, 1951.
Kane's second marriage was to Jinx Clark, a fellow cast member and star of Holiday on Ice. They married in 1951 after the European Holiday on Ice Tour. After Kane returned from the army with an honorable medical discharge in 1953, their marriage ended and they were divorced on May 19, 1954.[40]
Kane's third marriage was to skater Jeanne Cheadle, a member of the cast of Holiday on Ice, in 1955. This was one of Kane's shortest marriages and lasted less than a year. The couple divorced on December 12, 1955.[41]
Kane's fourth marriage was to another skater and cast member of Holiday on Ice, Sherry Wells in 1956. Kane had his first son, David born in 1957. The couple divorced on January 29, 1959. Wells remarried and changed David's last name to Russell. David Russell is a retired executive and basketball coach. Kane has two grandsons from David, Bryson Russell and Coleman Russell.
His fifth marriage was to singer and actress Jaye P. Morgan. Kane was Morgan's pianist and conductor during their marriage. They adopted Kane's second son, Paul Steven Kane in 1963. The couple divorced in 1966.[42]
In 1967, he married his sixth wife, Sara Jane Tallman Grusin, a studio singer in Los Angeles. Kane and Grusin had a son, Adam Kane, born in 1968. Adam is a film director in the Hollywood film studios.
Kane and Grusin divorced on September 15, 1970, after three years of marriage.[43]
Kane met his seventh wife, Carol Faith, through his friend, Charles Fox, while scoring at Warner Brothers. Faith was Fox's agent. They married in 1976 and divorced on June 4, 1979.
In 1981, Kane married JoAnn Johnson, a music copyist. They had been married more than thirty-six years and resided on Whidbey Island in Washington state.[44][43]
Kane died on June 21, 2022, at his home in Whidbey Island at the age of 93.[45]
Awards and honors
In 1976, Kane was nominated for a Grammy Award along with Ralph Grierson for a two-piano Gershwin Album, 'S Wonderful on Angel Records. He was given a BMI Sterling Circle Award for 25 years affiliation in 1993.[46] In 1998, he was inducted into the Columbus Senior Musicians Hall of Fame in Columbus, Ohio.[13]
Kane also received seven BMI TV Music Awards for his television work:
^"Jaye P. Morgan, Appearing in 'Guys and Dolls' Tomorrow at Oakdale, Discusses Marriage". The Bridgeport Post. Bridgeport, Connecticut. 18 June 1961. p. 33.
^Larsen, John (14 January 1962). "How Jaye P. Morgan Got Unusual Name". Green Bay Press-Gazette. Green Bay, Wisconsin. p. 38.
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