On the stage of the Italian Terrace Room in the William Penn Hotel in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1938 ... the place where Champagne Music was born.

I knew nothing of the life of a real musician, of course, but somehow I seemed to see myself standing in front of great crowds of people, playing my accordion.

I was so anxious to succeed that I made a practice of appearing on all the disc jockey shows I could, in order to publicize the band.

My accent remained terrible. It was very hard for me to initiate any conversation with someone I didn't know.

When my parents first arrived there, North Dakota had just been admitted to the Union, and the country was still wild and harsh.

By 1969, when I celebrated 45 years in the music business, I also had 45 people in our musical family.

If any performer has quality in his voice he can almost always be helped to develop all the other necessary attributes.