... probably didn't have a shaved head when he started out at eighteen un the Junior Dixieland Band. Fountain became a founding member of the Basin Street Six then worked with Phil Zito, Al Hirt and Monk Hazel before starting his own band, Pete Fountain and the Three Coins. He fortuitously scored a gig on The Lawrence Welk Show, starring in that program's Dixieland band for two years and simply became famous. He recorded extensively (and popularly) for Coral, and opened his own soon-to-be-popular club back home, Pete's Place, on Bourbon Street.
Fountain has a terrific tone and is an undeniable talent, but like trumpeter Al Hirt, by his own choice, Fountain has become more of an "entertainer," a figurehead of New Orleans jazz rather than an innovative musician. (Rick Koster, Louisiana Music p. 22)
Significant. File under: New Orleans Traditionalists
In the music library: Doctors, Professors, Kings & Queens: The Big Ol' Box Of New Orleans: Lazy River
Links: AllMusic Interview with Pete Fountain Music Rising at Tulane