I was in Britain that year [1963] and some music publishing people in Denmark Street in London suggested me to the BBC. So I found myself in front of a British television show, which was a nice surprise.

All that remains is the faces and the names of the wives and the sons and the daughters.

My first song was Hula Hoop Song, in 1955. It was a novelty song. I had to find someway to reach out and it was with a novelty song. Now, all of my recording obligations have been taken care of. I made 14 albums for Warner Brothers. Five for United Artist before that.

I'm a little nuts. I'm a lot nuts. All I know is that in the midst of the madness of this world it's my therapy. The music touches my heartstrings.

SPEAK OF TROUBLE highlights the abilities of Lowell Sostomi as singer/songwriter and brings together a talented band of musicians with amazing dexterity, loads of energy, and very original arrangements. Im impressed.

I try to write songs. At our concerts, we take the cream of the crop from my back catalogue and I don't know if I could write something now that would replace any of that. We don't lose any of the standards. We have lots of songs in rotation.

A lot of people influenced me as I was learning but probably Bing Crosby was the most influential, because I would hear his Christmas albums, which my parents played a lot.