The Goose Grease Violinist

Concert-goers either enjoyed or tolerated Jack Benny’s violin playing when he appeared at charity event. Musicians found interesting ways to find euphemisms for “he’s not very good.” But Benny raised great amounts of money and no doubt saved orchestras and concert halls from certain death.

Not many of Benny’s non-televised performances warranted mention in the national press, but one in Los Angeles on April 23, 1957 did, likely because the city was filled with entertainment columnists for newspaper syndicates and wire services, and they needed to write something.

Here’s an Associated Press story that appeared in papers the next day.

Jack Benny Plays Classics (They Lost)
By BOB THOMAS

LOS ANGELES (AP)— The Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra may never be the same.
Jack Benny, 39-year-old violinist of Waukegan, Ill., made a guest appearance last night at Philharmonic Auditorium. He played sections from Sarasate, Mendelssohn and Rimsky-Korsakoff. All three composers lost.
Such music lovers as Frank Sinatra, James Stewart, Claudette Colbert, Dana Wynter, Clifton Webb, Gregory Peck, Ann Miller and Sam Goldwyn paid $100 a seat to hear Mr. Benny’s West Coast debut as a concert artist. The event was for the benefit of Cedars of Lebanon Hospital.
Charity netted a reported $100,000. What happened to music is another matter.
Immaculate in white tie and tails, the violinist played vigorously while carrying on a running feud with the concertmaster. The latter interrupted with violin solos and was removed from the stage at the request of Mr. Benny.
The comedian’s stares were more eloquent than his cadenzas. But here and there was evidence that he might have gone farther with the fiddle if he had applied himself more back in Waukegan.
Between numbers he confessed to the audience that he had the feeling of not being needed by the orchestra—“like being stranded on a desert isle with Jayne Mansfield—and her boy friend.”
Albert Goldberg, the Los Angeles Times music critic, had this to say about Benny's playing:
“. . . As a violinist Mr. Benny has a small but offensive tone, and he apparently uses goose grease instead of resin on his bow.”

What did the Times writer have to say? Glad you asked. Here’s the answer:

Jack Benny Fiddles Around for Charity
BY ALBERT GOLDBERG
“The Jack Benny Show” was the legend on the marquee of Philharmonic Auditorium last night and it was indeed Mr. Benny’s show, although Dorothy Kirsten, soprano, and the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra under Alfred Wallenstein’s direction likewise contributed prominently to this $100-a-seat benefit sponsored by the Women’s Guild of Cedars of Lebanon Hospital for the free bed program. The audience was large and a personnel list would read like a Who’s Who in Hollywood.
Mr. Benny, in case you don’t know, is a violinist—and it is one way to make a living. He confessed to being nervous: “It’s like being on an island with Jayne Mansfield and her boy friend,” he said. “You have a feeling you’re not needed.”
Critical Note
But nerves or not, Mr. Benny was undeterred in attacking several of the more difficult items of the virtuoso repertoire. Since this is supposed to be a critical review we might as well note now that as a violinist Mr. Benny has a small but offensive tone and that he apparently uses goose grease instead of resin on his bow.
He came on to play Sarasate’s “Gypsy Airs” without his bow and had to send off for it. David Frisina, the orchestra’s concertmaster, obligingly filled in with the first cadenza when things began to look bad for Mr. Benny, an assist that the soloist apparently did not appreciate, for, after a whispered conference with Mr. Wallenstein, the concertmaster was asked to leave the stage, shortly to be followed by an industrious cymbal player who had likewise cramped Mr. Benny’s style. Mr. Benny celebrated his victory by adding “Love in Bloom” to the Sarasate piece without any great harm being done, and to everyone’s surprise he and the orchestra ended together.
Twinges of Conscience
The first movement of Mendelssohn’s E Minor Concerto was next served up for slaughter, but conscience first impelled Mr. Benny to send off for the music—“It’s a little hazardous,” he explained—and the stagehand who brought it also obligingly tuned Mr. Benny’s violin for him.
Aside from having to be reminded to come in with the second theme, Mr. Benny worked diligently with his task with what might be called an ocean wave technique, and when Heimann Weinstine, who had taken Mr. Frisina’s place, volunteered to help with the cadenza, he met with the same ingratitude as his predecessor. But by skipping the cadenza altogether Mr. Benny made it, by golly.
Since there were no more concertmasters left to banish Mr. Benny took the first chair for the second section of Rimsky-Korsakoff’s “Capriccio Espagnol.” This also contains a violin cadenza that enabled Mr. Benny to demonstrate his technique with merciless clarity, and except for having to caution Mr. Wallenstein to go slower he again emerged victorious.
The more serious part of the program had Miss Kirsten singing “Un bel di” from “Madame Butterfly” and “Depuis le jour” from “Louise” with her usual grace and soaring voice, and Mr. Wallenstein conducted the overture to Smetana’s “The Bartered Bride,” the suite from Strauss’ “Der Rosenlavalier” and the overture to Von Suppe’s “Poet and Peasant” in brilliant fashion.

The wife of one of Jack’s old friends, Mervyn LeRoy, organised the charity concert, while Mrs. David May II was in charge of a supper-dance that followed at the Beverly Hills Hotel (note to our younger readers that there was once a custom that, when formally referring to a wife, the husband’s given name was used instead of the woman’s).

The concert was a success, at least from a charitable standpoint. The Times reported in a sidebar story that $100,000 was raised. Goose grease notwithstanding, Jack Benny had contributed to society yet again.