Sam Ulano an interview with Andrew Cohen

[Music] drum solo going along now [Music] luck day you know well my little baby now I can't give you anything I can't give you anything I can't give you anything but [Music] this is Samuel an saying have fun with your [Music] drums we're going to play some rest skipping the repeat 1 and two and three and four and one and two three and four what you like to know so Sam can you tell me very briefly just the story of your life just for very very short you want my drum music life or my life itself both I was born in August 20th August 12th 1920 so that makes me now 88 years August 12th I'll be 89 and I'm a twin with my twin brother who lives down in Florida he's still going he's still going who is that t your twin brother still going he lives down in Boer China he always sits on his butt you know and but that's another story and uh my life has been strictly i' somebody said to me the other day that I was amazing to him because I'm doing the same job all my life for 79 years I never I never did anything else I started at 13 and I've been drumming all my life I heard you started teaching right away right I started teaching when I was 15 and I wrote a book called Bas Bops in fact I had a copy here it was my first drum book and it was the first drum book to come out between hands and feet open up you'll see this origin this was published 1948 that's 60 years ago wow and it was the first book on hand and foot and everybody thought it was crazy I said yeah but I saw Jean ker playing sing sing sing at the Paramount 1935 with two feet and two hands I said why can't I do that and I started to write this book and this book still on the market and still going wow it's one of 3800 00 drum books that I've written at this time 3,800 38 3,800 Sam how come uh how come people have called you the drum Christ I made that word up you made it up I made it up well teaching teaching is like a calling and it is uh you get into somebody's brain sure yeah I've had students I have right now about seven guys that were alcoholics going to meetings or what so some with me four or five years and broke that problem why cuz they replaced that what we call a bad problem with something to occupy their brain right was trying to get better at the instrument and they all did and my teaching is different than anybody else that's teaching all around the world everybody I think is buried in Tradition and if they don't get out of it they'll stay there they'll never move they won't get off the dime they're still holding on to what happened yesterday and yesterday's history and tomorrow you don't know about he don't know about he don't know about and I don't know about when I wake up tomorrow morning morning about 4:30 5:00 then I have another 24 hours of my life that's what the 24 on that thing says you don't have anything else but that 24 hours if you read my book it's the first Topic in the book right it says we got 24 hours nothing more nothing less now what do you do with the 24 hours that's the trick so what else would you like that so you said you said we all need to have a system why why do you say that you got to have a system otherwise life is going to be disrupted it's going it's so obvious I get up in the morning every day about 4:30 I do my duties and I get dressed the first thing I do is it's two days a week I have breakfast in the senior citizen building I live in and the other days that I come here I start teaching at 6 : one day and 7:00 and 7:30 another morning and I have my breakfast delivered and I write books I wrote in one week two weeks in the last two weeks I wrote 13 drum books wow why cuz I got a sstem you know what think of this supermarkets a bank the police department the fire department the government the world everybody has a system because they're organizations we may not like them but they get things done because they're organized the average person by himself if he doesn't stay organized oh gee I forgot to send my taxes and there I didn't keep track of this and all of a sudden trying to remember what they did well where were you last we they can't remember what they did with their life so if you you got to what you like whether it's the system that you want to keep going and evidently it's doing something for you so that's the system you follow so you're saying we need one without a system without it you're screwed you're messed up you got to have a system so I appeared before the senate in 19 2000 rather 2003 oh really the senate committee on Aging myself Lyn Swan from formerly from the Pittsburgh deers and Judy I forget her last name anyway there was four of us on this panel discussing what senior citizens can do to help them live a better life and the the problem with Mo I live in a senior citizen building everybody sits on their Duff all day long they can't wait for breakfast and they can't wait for lunch and what' you do all day man what is that to do you know there's a lot to do I leave the place at uh 6:00 in the morning I come here after I have my breakfast and I start writing or I start teaching or start practicing myself I practice with a sister what's the source of your infectious positivity my what your infectious positivity my infectious what positivity what is the source what's the source of it of your it's inside me what's the source what where do it come from yeah well the without me I I guess I sound conceited so I'm going to be conceited I know what I'm doing I'm never confused when you and I spoke on the phone two weeks ago so forth and so on I don't know if you heard uh somebody tell you what kind of a nut job I am or not you got to be crazy to be in this business business you know that but really I'm not I think I know exactly what I'm saying so the source of your your sense of positivity is com is com from confidence it comes from knowing what you're doing you know what you're doing yeah I think so aren't you positive in what you're doing very much so well it's got to come from knowing what you what you know in your field of uh yeah but there are other there there are other people that are 89 that that live that lived productive lives and that knew what they were doing in their work that that don't have the positivity that you do it your age well they don't have any purpose for their life anymore at that that time right what what is my purpose I I still have students I make a couple dollars in in the teaching uh my positivity is in how I write I've written all these books and not two of them are the same you say How could somebody do that George gers wrote he died at the age of 38 and he wrote 500 hit songs plus an for poy invest the raps City in blue come on it's if the brain is capable of doing that if you don't get Alzheimer you know that that means your brain is shut down yeah if my brain is not shut down it it's wide awake one and and three and four and one and two and three and four and one trip two trip 3 4 1 2 3 3 one triple and two triple letter three triple letter four triple so what's the secret to happiness well it's hard to say this to a lot of people but it's true I only did in my life what I love to do I have a passion for what I do you got to have a passion for it you want to have a happy life I go to the Post Office there's people I see there already for 30 years 40 years getting fat out of condition and can't wait to retire and they don't retire well if I do another four or five years I'll get this in money and they're unhappy in their life if you do what you love to do but you know that what you're doing it's got to see I don't believe in doing uh a job that might be nice but it doesn't give me any kind of reward I'm not talking dollars and cents sure I have three letters in my what's called My Philosophy of life it's called H EF health education and finances without those three pieces you're a dead duck today think about it first of all the first one is the key without good health you can I don't care if you wor1 million and you have cancer or diabetes or Parkinson Louis bson died from Parkinson he was a de friend of mine for many many years Max rhods died from Alzheimer Papa Joe Jones was in a Veterans Hospital dying from cancer and I and Max Ro were the only two guys that visited him his a guy was about 74 75 when he passed on and he was trying to light a cigarette he was half half his weight he said nobody comes to see me Sam where's all all my friends I said well they probably got jobs and they I try to give him some excuse you know but that's what happens so I think it's got to come from inside you what else would you like can I tell you how do you develop self-confidence well you got to know what you're doing and why you're doing it and you can't predict the results at the end of the line but I was able to when I was 15 started to write I wrote that book bbops when I was 15 and at that time I knew that I had a writing talent I don't know what it was and I used to sit and write I had about 35 40 kids studying with me for 50 cents a lesson really they were coming to my apartment in the Bronx yeah and I knew with inside myself that I was on the right track and I used to be told by all my relative I come from a very big family my mother had two sets of twins we were 10 children five boys and five girls and everybody used to lecture me you're never going to make a living out of playing music all musicians are starving I said you know all the musicians in the world you know everybody in the philonic in the in the Boston Symphony in the Chicago Symphony you know everybody in Benny Goodman's band Harry Jan's band Woody heyman's band and you don't know any anybody well I know a guy who get you know one guy out of 300 million people in the United States give me a break you know you've heard that expression sure so it's got you it's got to be within yourself you say well how do you know it's there I always say it's like love you you'll know it when it's [Music] there do you have to have have natural gift in order to succeed well meaning a natural inborn Talent yeah that's debatable with me because somebody says he's a born drummer I never saw a baby come out of his mother's womb with a full set of slinging or Gretch drums start swinging on the day he was born we have a talent yeah whether we it a lot has to do with who you meet along the way who teaches you I studied with 40 different teachers in my career is the truth today I can honestly tell you nobody knew what they were doing I did a lot of what I'm doing I had to do on my own through 10 hours a day practicing I was nothing for me to do 15 hours a day really yeah wow I still play on an average of 10 hours a day at 88 what do you you talking about but uh you know the the the question is uh if if if if you have to have a natural gift in order to succeed I don't believe there's such thing as a natural gift I'm a big believe there's a God I don't debate that when that's for myself I talk to God every day I don't go to SCH I don't go to the synagogue for y Kipper I teach on Yer I teach on the Russ Shona I do on Passover I don't eat matzas only I eat bread and the and so far I looked up to God and I I never died I told him I'm teaching on y k and he says go ahead nobody even sees you don't worry about it you know so when you say a guy goes to the Wailing Wall in Israel J Jerusalem and a guy goes he sees the old man he says you come here every day the old man says yeah he says how old are you he says I'm 95 he says you come in here every day he says he says and you pray every day he says every day say does you ever get an answer and he says no it's like talking through a wall he tells them but uh so what does the word God mean to you what does God mean to me yeah well it's an inner it's my inner self I don't know if it's the same thing it means for everybody else but I I've always had a feeling about myself as corny as it my sound that something is watching over me uh call it God call it whatever we going to call it but I've never had a problem I never lost my voice I'm able to sing I can sing it fairly I know a lyrics to maybe 500 songs wow I remember telephone numbers for almost most of my students and family and all that I don't have to look at my book and see if I got it right and all that so uh somebody said I'm blessed with whatever it is but that's the feeling I have about this thing I can't I can't give you proof on the whether there's God or not neither can anybody else but they can't give me proof there isn't and uh I don't believe Charlton Hon's God definitely [Music] not V jazz jazz walls and the vies walls are the same thing most guys you say can you play a Greek 98 Greek or Miss they don't know that they know how to bash the drum set and destroy the instrument and wind up with a loss of 80% of the hearing