Early life and education Antoine Domino Jr. was born and raised in
New Orleans, Louisiana, the youngest of eight children born to Antoine Caliste Domino (1879–1964) and Marie-Donatille Gros (1886–1971). The Domino family was of
French Creole background, and
Louisiana Creole was his first language. Like most such families, the Dominos were
Catholic. Antoine was born at home with the assistance of his grandmother, a midwife. His name was initially misspelled as Anthony on his birth certificate. His family had recently arrived in the
Lower Ninth Ward from
Vacherie, Louisiana. His father was a part-time violin player who worked at a racetrack. Domino learned to play the piano in about 1938 from his brother-in-law, the jazz guitarist
Harrison Verrett.
Early career (1940s) By age 14, Domino was performing in New Orleans bars. In 1947, Billy Diamond, a New Orleans bandleader, accepted an invitation to hear the young pianist perform at a backyard barbecue. Domino played well enough that Diamond asked him to join his band, the Solid Senders, at the Hideaway Club in New Orleans, where he would earn $3 a week playing the piano. In 2015, the song would enter the
Grammy Hall of Fame.
Lee Allen, and Fred Kemp, Domino's trusted bandleader." on
The Ed Sullivan Show in 1956 While Domino's own recordings were done for Imperial, he sometimes sat in during that time as a session musician on recordings by other artists for other record labels. Domino's rolling piano triplets provided the memorable instrumental introduction for
Lloyd Price's first hit, "
Lawdy Miss Clawdy", recorded for
Specialty Records on March 13, 1952, at
Cosimo Matassa's
J&M Recording Studios in New Orleans (where Domino himself had earlier recorded "The Fat Man" and other songs). Dave Bartholomew was producing Price's record, which also featured familiar Domino collaborators Hardesty, Fields and Palmer as sidemen, and he asked Domino to play the piano part, replacing the original session pianist. Domino crossed into the
pop mainstream with "
Ain't That a Shame" (mislabeled as "Ain't It a Shame") which reached the Top Ten. This was the first of his records to appear on the Billboard pop singles chart (on July 16, 1955), with the debut at number 14. A milder cover version by
Pat Boone reached number 1, having received wider radio airplay in an era of racial segregation. In 1955, Domino was said to be earning $10,000 a week while touring, according to a report in
Chuck Berry's memoir. Domino eventually had 37
Top 40 singles, but none made it to number 1 on the Pop chart. The reissue reached number 17 on the
Billboard Pop Albums chart. His 1956 recording of "
Blueberry Hill", a 1940 song by
Vincent Rose,
Al Lewis and
Larry Stock (which had previously been recorded by
Glenn Miller,
Gene Autry,
Louis Armstrong and others), reached number 2 on the Billboard Juke Box chart for two weeks and was number 1 on the R&B chart for 11 weeks. It was his biggest hit, Some 32 years later, the song would enter the Grammy Hall of Fame. In 1957, Domino maintained "What they call rock 'n' roll now is rhythm and blues. I've been playing it for 15 years in New Orleans". Domino appeared in two films released in 1956:
Shake, Rattle & Rock! and ''
The Girl Can't Help It''. On December 18, 1957, his hit recording of "The Big Beat" was featured on
Dick Clark's
American Bandstand. He was also featured in a movie of the same name. On November 2, 1956, a riot broke out at a Domino concert in
Fayetteville, North Carolina. The police used tear gas to break up the unruly crowd. Domino jumped out a window to avoid the melee; he and two members of his band were slightly injured. During his career, four major riots occurred at his concerts, "partly because of integration", according to his biographer Rick Coleman. "But also the fact they had alcohol at these shows. So they were mixing alcohol, plus dancing, plus the races together for the first time in a lot of these places." In August 1957, he was banned from performing at
Griffith Stadium in Washington, DC due to security concerns raised by city commissioner Robert McLaughlin. In November 1957, Domino appeared on
The Ed Sullivan Show; no disturbance accompanied this performance. In the same year, the article "King of Rock 'n' Roll" in
Ebony magazine featured Domino who said he was on the road 340 days a year, up to $2,500 per evening, and grossing over $500,000; Domino also told readers that he owned 50 suits, 100 pairs of shoes and a $1,500 diamond horseshoe stick pin. After returning, he played the first of his many stands in Las Vegas. and Domino left the label. "I stuck with them until they sold out," he said in 1979. In all, he recorded over 60 singles for Imperial, placing 40 songs in the top 10 on the R&B chart and 11 in the top 10 on the Pop chart, twenty-seven of which were double-sided hits.
Recordings after leaving Imperial (1963–1970s) Domino moved to
ABC-Paramount Records in 1963. The label dictated that he record in
Nashville, Tennessee, rather than New Orleans. He was assigned a new producer (
Felton Jarvis) and a new arranger (
Bill Justis). Domino's long-term collaboration with the producer, arranger, and frequent co-writer
Dave Bartholomew, who oversaw virtually all of his Imperial hits, Despite the lack of chart success, Domino continued to record steadily until about 1970, leaving ABC-Paramount in mid-1965 and recording for
Mercury Records, where he delivered a live album ''
Fats Domino '65'' and two singles. A studio album was planned but stalled with just four tracks recorded. Dave Bartholomew's small Broadmoor label (reuniting with Bartholomew along the way), featured many contemporary Soul infused sides and a few single releases but an album was not released overseas until 1971 to fulfill his
Reprise Records contract. He shifted to that label after Broadmoor and had a Top 100 single, a cover of
the Beatles' "
Lady Madonna". He continued to be popular as a performer for several decades. He made a cameo appearance in Clint Eastwood's movie
Any Which Way You Can, filmed in 1979 and released in 1980, singing the country song "Whiskey Heaven", which later became a minor hit. His life and career were showcased in Joe Lauro's 2015 documentary ''The Big Beat: Fats Domino and the Birth of Rock 'n' Roll''.
Later career (1980s–2005) In 1986, Domino was one of the first musicians to be inducted into the
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Domino lived in a mansion in a predominantly
working-class neighborhood in the
Lower Ninth Ward, where he was a familiar sight in his bright pink
Cadillac automobile. He made yearly appearances at the
New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival and other local events. His last tour was in Europe, for three weeks in 1995. After being ill while on tour, Domino decided he would no longer leave the New Orleans area, having a comfortable income from
royalty payments and a dislike of touring and claiming he could not get any food that he liked anywhere else. Domino declined an invitation to perform at the
White House.
Domino and Hurricane Katrina (2005)As
Hurricane Katrina approached New Orleans in August 2005, Domino chose to stay at home with his family, partly because his wife, Rosemary, was in poor health. His house was in an area that was heavily flooded. Domino was rumored to have died in the hurricane, Embry confirmed that Domino and his family had been rescued. The family was then taken to a shelter in
Baton Rouge, after which they were picked up by
JaMarcus Russell, the starting quarterback of the
Louisiana State University football team, and the boyfriend of Domino's granddaughter. He let the family stay in his apartment.
The Washington Post reported that on September 2, they had left Russell's apartment after sleeping three nights on the couch. "We've lost everything," Domino said, according to the
Post. By January 2006, work to gut and repair Domino's home and office had begun (see
Reconstruction of New Orleans). In the meantime, the Domino family resided in
Harvey, Louisiana. President
George W. Bush made a personal visit and replaced the National Medal of Arts that President
Bill Clinton had previously awarded Domino. The gold records were replaced by the
RIAA and
Capitol Records, which owned the Imperial Records catalogue.
Later life Domino was scheduled to perform at the 2006 Jazz & Heritage Festival in New Orleans. However, he was suffering from
anxiety and was forced to cancel the performance, but he did appear to offer the audience an on-stage greeting. In 2006 Domino's album ''
Alive and Kickin''' was released to benefit the
Tipitina's Foundation, which supports indigent local musicians and helps preserve the New Orleans sound. The album consists of unreleased recordings from the 1990s and received great critical acclaim. on August 29, 2006, after the original medal, awarded to him by President
Bill Clinton, was lost in the floodwaters of
Hurricane Katrina. On January 12, 2007, Domino was honored with
OffBeat magazine's Lifetime Achievement Award at the annual Best of the Beat Awards, held at the
House of Blues in New Orleans. New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin declared the day "Fats Domino Day in New Orleans" and presented him with a signed declaration. Domino returned to stage on May 19, 2007, at
Tipitina's at New Orleans, performing to a full house. This was his last public performance. In September 2007, Domino was inducted into the
Louisiana Music Hall of Fame. In May 2009, Domino made an unexpected appearance in the audience for the Domino Effect, a concert featuring
Little Richard and other artists, aimed at raising funds to help rebuild schools and playgrounds damaged by Hurricane Katrina. In October 2012, Domino was featured in season three of the television series
Treme, playing himself.
Death Domino died on October 24, 2017, at his home in
Harvey, Louisiana, at the age of 89, from natural causes, according to the coroner's office. ==Influence and legacy==