Like most US cities, Pittsburgh had a thriving club scene back in the 1960's. From top jazz venues such as the Hurricane Lounge and Crawford Grill through bars / lounges to bigger venues such as the Penn Theatre, Stanley Theatre, Civic Arena & Syria Mosque. A wide selection of live acts were performing around the city, both black singers and blue-eyed soulsters (Pittsburgh had more than it's fair share of these). On any given weekend, you could catch top acts performing in various different venues ...

I asked Chuck Corby about his early years in the business and he confirmed that he played all the same venues as other locals (George Benson, Billy Sha-rae, Jimmy Beaumont, etc.) The bigger venues around town played host to big recording acts. So, you could catch a wide selection of acts on a regular basis back then ... Chuck confirmed that he played all the same venues as the likes of Billy Sha-rae and the two shared the stage on occasions, I'd have loved to have witnessed one of those shows ...

A great line up at Penn theatre .

Thanks for sharing Roburt,

1 hour ago, Kenmidgley said:

A great line up at Penn theatre .

Thanks for sharing Roburt,

That review was playing gigs up & down the US eastern seaboard at the time (Pittsburgh, Baltimore, DC, Philly, New York, etc.). Even more acts on the review for some shows, see below.

Love the MABEL & JOHN entry; guess the phone ad taker knew very little about the stars who were going to appear locally.

Edited yesterday at 14:081 day by Roburt

MORE FROM CHUCK ... connected to the Pittsburgh venues in my 1st post ... back in 1964-65 I was with the group Four Plus One we were playing right down the street on route 51, for John Adams at the Golden Nugget. At that time route 51 was what they called 'Cocktail Canyon', filled with night clubs all up and down the Strip. Jimmy Beaumont was playing the hottest club at that time, the Las Vegas nightclub. On the other side was the San Francisco nightclub. Someone told Jimmy about this young kid singing at the Golden Nugget, so Jimmy came in one night (He never told anybody he was there to hear me). Then he told one of the ladies who worked there (Patty Patrone) to tell us to go up to the Las Vegas one afternoon -- I believe it was on a Wednesday audition day. I couldn't believe it, so we did just what he asked. At the time, I really respected Jimmy, in my estimation he was the best of all time. We went to the club, told the manager who we were & that Jimmy Beaumont had sent us. The manager told us to hold on and he went to get Jimmy and the owner who weren't there at that time. Back then I wanted to be Jimmy Beaumont, I tried to sing just like him, act like him on stage. When we were finished performing Jimmy called me over and said the owner likes you, he wants to hire you. Jimmy said "Chuck, you have to be yourself, don't try to be me. Be yourself and I think you can go a long way in this business". I'll never forget the advice he gave me at the time. He had no clue who I was. There wasn't a Chuck Corby yet. I was still Chucky Ciorra from the little Italian community in Pittsburgh .....

Chuck also confirmed that he & Billy Sha-rae kept in touch after Billy relocated to Detroit. Chuck was over in the Motor City to perform at a club; Harold's Club. He got up on stage with Billy and his group one night. We performed together for a long time as they were the house band at this club there. That was way back in the '60s and it was probably the last time Chuck saw Billy.

Luckily, I found an ad from that era, when Chuck was performing with his first group, FOUR + 1 (Chuck being the 1).

Edited Monday at 18:082 days by Roburt

A scan from my Chuck Corby article in a recent SOUL UP NORTH mag (#121) ... ALSO a pic of Chuck performing way back in 1961 + a pic of him with FOUR + 1 ...

Edited Monday at 18:352 days by Roburt

Thanks for sharing. The flyers and line ups are great.