Gary James' Interview With Johnny Farina Of
Santo And Johnny



Their song, an instrumental song called "Sleep Walk" spent two weeks at number one on the Billboard charts in September, 1959. It earned them a Gold Record and they went on to tour the world. They appeared on American Bandstand, The Perry Como Show, The Alan Freed Show. They appeared in clubs and casinos all over Europe. They even had their own TV show in Italy! They would go on to record over forty albums worldwide. In 1999, "Sleepwalk" earned BMI's Millionaires Award for two million airplays on the radio. That same year, Brian Setzer earned a Grammy Award for Best Instrumental for his recording of "Sleep Walk". The duo we are talking about is Santo And Johnny, two brothers from Brooklyn, New York. There is just so much to their story that we talked with Johnny Farina of Santo And Johnny.

Q - Johnny, you are currently a solo act, is that correct?

A - Yes. Since 1973 I've been a solo act.

Q - And Santo is semi-retired?

A - Fully retired in '73, '74.

Q - Is there a chance he'd show up at one of your gigs?

A - No. That's not gonna happen.

Q - Your father was in the Army.

A - Yeah.

Q - He heard somebody playing the steel guitar on the radio.

A - He was stationed in Texas and Oklahoma and he wrote a letter home to my mom, and see, it's funny because in those days the mailmen would come and ring a bell and he'd be carrying a leather pouch. I never forgot. His name was Sam and he'd ring the bell and he'd sing "You have a letter, Mrs. Farina." It's like in the old days, the Pony Express. (laughs) Then I remember when I was a kid, my mom was reading the letter 'cause we used to wait to hear news about my father. She said, "Your father says he's been listening to this kind of cowboy music. He said he hears this beautiful instrument and he's not sure what it's called." He thought it was a Hawaiian guitar or steel guitar. He was right on both. He said, "I want the boys to learn how to play this." My mom said, "He wants you and your brother to learn how to play this guitar." We're looking at her really puzzled. We lived in a predominantly Italian-Irish neighborhood. The only music I ever heard was musicians on the corner, outside in the summertime playing an accordion, a mandolin and acoustic guitar. Nobody ever had a steel guitar. It was a very difficult task that my father ordered. You know how Italians are, when they make a demand, they want it done. So, it sort of meant an offer we couldn't refuse.

Q - How fortunate you were that your father was so enthusiastic about music.

A - Yeah.

Q - Was your father a frustrated musician?

A - No. The ironic thing about my father is that he was born in Sicily. He came over to this country (the U.S.) when he was nine. You would think he was born here because he had no trace of Italian accent. He never played anything. I only remember him in the years he came home from the Army, he'd play the radio. That was it. He never even picked up an instrument, but for some reason this steel guitar got into his head. He was stationed in Texas and Oklahoma, so he was really exposed every day to Country And Western. Actually, he used to listen to Roy Acuff and people like that. He wanted us to play Country and we never really got into Country. We got into R&B. We got into listening to other songs after we learned how to play. But it was my father all the while that pushed us. He knew that we were writing songs after we got good at playing. We'd be writing songs and he'd be coming home from work and he'd hear us jamming. We would be doing cover tunes. Then after we'd do cover tunes we just started to jam, but we did not realize we were creating songs. So, one day my father comes home from work and said, "Why don't you play that song you played yesterday?" And we didn't know which song he was talking about because we were writing without realizing it. We said, "Is it that one?" "No." He decided to go buy a Webster tape recorder and he said, "Listen, from now on, every time you do that jam, whatever you do, you must record it because you're writing music and you don't even know it.

Q - Your father was one smart guy! He could've been your manager!

A - He should have been our manager! (laughs) I'm gonna tell you something. He loved the music so much that his last words when he was leaving this world and going on to the next one were, "Make me a promise," and my wife was there at the time and I said, "Yeah." I thought he wanted me to do something special. He said, "Promise me you'll never stop playing the steel." I said, "I could never do that. I'll always play the steel." And that was it. If it wasn't for my dad, Santo and I would not have had any success as far as being musicians. I have no idea what kind of job I would be doing today if it wasn't for my job. It was him that instilled the steel guitar into our lives. Unfortunately he didn't get to see us inducted into the Hall Of Fame. He passed just before we were inducted into the Steel Guitar Hall Of Fame. I would've taken him with me, but unfortunately he passed, so he never saw it. Maybe he sees it now. (laughs) He could have seen it from up above, you know?

Q - Who knows? Maybe he knows everything! We don't know what's on the other side.

A - We don't know.

Q - We're just sitting here doing the best we can.

A - Right.

Q - Had your father not encouraged you to learn steel guitar, was there any interest on your part just to learn guitar?

A - No. No interest at all. We had no interest in sports. The only interest I had in music was listening to music, not playing it. We had an old Zenith radio or a Philco (radio). It had a big speaker. I used to put my ear as close to it as possible. I thought by doing that I could capture more sound. They thought I was deaf, but I wanted to get so close to it that I would visualize. If Frankie Laine was singing "Mule Train" I'd be like a cowboy on a horse and crackin' a whip. When Bing Crosby would sing, I would visualize everything he was singing. So, I was influenced by those sounds, but I never had the thought of playing that kind of guitar or any guitar. We were just kids growing up, you know? We were just thinking if we were going to have macaroni and meatballs. (laughs)

Q - You said, "We were writing songs." I always thought Santo was the primary songwriter. So, you were writing as well?

A - We wrote always together. It was only Santo and I that wrote those songs. There's so much mis-information out there. You'll read that "Sleep Walk" was written by Santo and Johnny and their sister. We have no sister. You might see Santo and Johnny's mother wrote "Sleep Walk". There's a lot of mis-information. For me to go around and tweak it just creates problems. I just let people say what they want to say. All I know is Santo stopped playing in '73, '74. I kept going. I keep writing. I keep producing. I've been in the business. I've never stopped. I have new product out. I have CDs that I put out on my own. I have originals that I wrote. There's a lot of mis-information out there and unfortunately you can't stop it.

Q - Maybe, just maybe this interview will help correct some of the mis-information that's out there. Now, when you guys were teenagers you formed an instrumental group and you played dances and parties. No singing what-so-ever?

A - No singing. Maybe once in a while I would get up and I would sing one or two songs, but easy songs to sing that you don't have to be a singer to carry the melody. I'm not a singer, like "Shake It Up Baby" (Twist And Shout). Any easy song that anybody could sing as long as the music is loud enough to drown out the voice. (laughs)

Q - As an instrumental group, what kind of music were you playing? The Ventures? Duane Eddy?

A - Not really, because the way we played the steel (guitar), that was our voice. So, we would cover all the vocals to like "Silhouettes" and "In The Still Of The Night". But then we did "Caravan", "Summertime". If you ever saw our first album or ever heard it, there's "Caravan" on it, there's "Summertime". As a matter of fact, when we got our record deal, I got the record deal 'cause Santo is almost four years older than me and he was working. He was married. In those days people got married young. He got married at 18. I quit school at 16. I told my father I really have to follow this dream and I know that we're going to be famous. When I was a kid, maybe at the age of ten, I didn't know how, but I always saw myself as being famous, but I didn't know what I was going to be famous at as far as with the steel. I didn't know that was going to be the key, but I just knew that I was going to be an important person. I was going to make my mark on this planet. So, at 16 I told my brother we should go in and make some demo records. He didn't want to be involved in it. He said, "Listen, I'm working. I have a job. I'm married." I said, "Listen, you don't have to do anything. I'll go around and see if I can get a deal." So, against his will, we went in, we got a drummer and we went in and made a demo, a couple of demos. I think they were $3 each. And I started shopping them around. First, I bought two books. One was on record companies and the other was on publishers. I just looked to see which were the nearest companies I could reach out to. I didn't drive. I was living in Brooklyn. I could only take the train to wherever I had to go. So, I figured New York was going to be the place, the music place. So, I started to circle off all the companies in the Brill Building and I never tried to make an appointment. I'd just knock on the door. In those days you could do that. You could knock on the door and they'd say, "Yeah." You'd tell 'em you have a demo. They would ask you what kind of a demo you had. They wanted to know if it was Doo-Wop. I said. "It's not Doo-Wop. It's a different type of music. It's a steel guitar." That's it! They didn't want to hear it. I said, "But this is different. It's not Hawaiian and it's not cowboy music." I didn't know the terminology of Country. I said, "It's not cowboy music." They said, "No, no." I used to walk out and say, "You're going to be sorry someday." "Yeah, kid. Get the hell out of here." So, they'd chase me out. Not one person in the Brill Building ever heard "Sleep Walk". I said, "One day this is going to be the biggest instrumental on the planet." They'd all laugh. So finally I got tired of that scene and I decided to hit publishers. So, I tried to see some publishers and they all gave me the same story. "Do you have an appointment?" I said no. So finally one day I'm picking out names of companies I thought I'd be lucky at. There was one company, Trinity Music. So, I'm Catholic. Trinity, Father, Son, Holy Ghost. Maybe this is a sign for me to go to. So, I never forgot, it was 101 55th Street. I go up I think to the second floor and there was like a door there. It didn't look fancy or anything, but it was half open. So, I pushed it open and there was a man sitting down. There was a pastrami sandwich from where I was standing and he turns around and says, "I know kid. You have a hit record." So immediately I thought, see, I was sent here. This is an omen. God sent me here. This man knows I have a hit record. I said, "How do you know I have a hit record?" He said, "Kid, everybody has a hit record. I've been listening to hit records all day!" I said "Really" (laughs) I really thought he was. He said, "Listen, leave it here because I have to clean my ears." I didn't know what he meant by that. Later on I knew what he meant. I said, "Why do have to clean your ears?" He said, "Because I've been listening to music all day long. I just have to get away from it for now." I said, "Alright. Why don't you listen to this?" And he didn't want to do it and I said, "Listen, you're gonna kick yourself in the butt if you don't listen to this thing," and I guess he saw how persistent I was. He finally said, "Alright, put it on the Victrola." Alright. I look at his machine and I thought he was going to have a really great machine. He had just like a little, junky machine. It had like a penny on it so the arm didn't jump, you know? I said, "Wait a second. This thing might ruin my record." Don't worry about it. Just play it." So, as soon as he heard it he said, "You want half of my sandwich?" And I knew I had him. I said, "Can I have the pickle too?" And he laughed and he gave me the pickle and that was the beginning of how "Sleep Walk" got the deal.

Q - That publishing deal led to your record deal with Canadian-American Records, didn't it?

A - Yeah. What happened was then was we leased it to Canadian-American and that was it. The rest is history. Actually, after that, later on we wound up in Italy and signed to an Italian label. We were on Liberty for a short while, but then we signed to an Italian label. We were there until the act finally broke up. But when we were in Italy we had a lot of success. We did the cover records on Thunderball, Goldfinger, You Only Live Twice. We had hits with that. Aside from that we did over thirty albums there. We had such big success with all the instrumentals we did, but probably the two major, major hits that we had was the first one, "Sleep Walk" and in '73 it was "Padrino", which is the "Godfather". That was on the charts for 26 weeks in Italy.

Q - Didn't you have a TV show in Italy? Was that a variety show?

A - No. That was our own. It was pre-MTV actually. (laughs) We would go to Rome and we would dress up in costume. We would be like minstrels and we'd be traveling. We had a horse and wagon. We had a ballerina. We had a court jester. Our music would be playing, cuts from our CD and then we would get to where we had to go and then we'd perform. They'd show us getting back on the covered wagon. Actually, sometimes they would let me hold the reigns for the horse, but it was very difficult to control six horses. One day the lead horse went nuts. He started running down a mountain and we almost went off the mountain. Good thing that the guy was in back of the wagon and he jumped forward and he jumped on the horse like you see in the movies and actually stopped the horse. It was crazy.

Q - How long did it take you guys to write "Sleep Wall"?

A - I would say; one night we finished playing, went to a diner and after that we went home. Instead of sleeping we started to write and I guess we started to hit on the melody and I guess (it took) maybe a week. We would play it and go on to another one and then we'd play it again. We were always drawn back to work on "Sleep Walk". We did a piece of "All Night Diner", which was the flip side and we went on to a couple of other songs and then went back to "Sleep Walk" because my father's idea to have the tape recorder gave us the opportunity to go back to them and say, "Okay, now we need a bridge." Sometimes we had the first part, but we didn't have the bridge. On "Sleep Walk" we had the harmonic. We had basically the first part of it, but then we needed the bridge. We had a couple of bridges. We weren't sure which one we wanted. One we thought was stronger than the other. Finally, maybe like the last day or something, before we'd made the demo I changed the bridge. I told my brother I have a good bridge for it. I think it's the strongest one of all and we had three or four bridges to pick from and I have copies of all the first, second and third bridges that we had, but that second bridge I said was the strongest bridge. It just picks it right up and takes it away and that was it.

Q - How did Santo's wife get credit for writing that song? Any idea?

A - Yeah. (laughs) The truth is that we had people that advised us. They would always give us advice and say, "Financially there's ways. It's better for you to put more names on it, the more people can share the pie." That was one of the things. He wanted his wife to get credit for writing because she was taking a course in school, you know, they have classes in school for music. They teach students basis music. So, she wanted her name on there to give her credibility. But she didn't write anything, but she wanted her name on there and he wanted her name on there 'cause he thought if her name was on there and the record became popular, people would see her name and then she would have credibility if she did anything in the future. It's such a bizarre story that it didn't make sense to me. The other thing for taxes is it's better to share the money. I said, "I don't think it's a good idea," but that's what happened.

Q - You and your brother appeared on American Bandstand. What was that like? What was Dick Clark like?

A - He was totally different than Alan Freed. Alan Freed was one type of man. Dick Clark was another type of man. When you dealt with Dick Clark you could see he was like Mr. All American. It was a good show. It was important that people saw it all around the country and people in Europe probably saw it too, saw tapes of it or something, but he was a nice man. I was doing projects through the years. There was a foundation, For The Love Of Rock And Roll. I don't know if you've ever heard of that. They had an idea to build a home for all the musicians that were not financially able to take care of themselves and so they made a foundation. It was supposed to be in Florida. They were going to build condos for the musicians who weren't as fortunate as people like me. They were going to live down there for free. But then they decided for some reason to put it up in Lennox, Massachusetts. They had a lot of property. They had this big building. Dick Clark got involved in that too. Through the years I ran across Dick Clark many times. I remember the music awards. The first song the band played was "Sleep Walk". Dick Clark said, "Better get up there and tell then you're here." He was a nice man. I knew him and his wife. Through the years we had a good relationship.

Q - And Alan Freed. You were on his radio show. What kind of guy was he?

A - He was just a down to earth man. We were on his TV show too. He had The Big Beat on channel 5. He had the Rock 'n' Roll shows. They were like marathons. They used to show movies. They had the Rock 'n' Roll show. Once you went there you'd go there early and you'd come home at night. I think we did two shows a day. It's been so many years ago. Alan Freed was the one who said when he heard "Sleep Walk", "This song is never gonna die." He loved it. He said, "It's so different. It's gonna change some of the way music is." Later on I found out that George Harrison wrote in his liner notes on "Let It Roll" that "Marwa Blues" was because of "Teardrop" and John Lennon wrote "Free As A Bird" because of "Sleep Walk". And the guy from Fleetwood Mac, I forget his name, wrote "Albatross" because of "Sleep Walk". So many people covered it. Jeff Beck covered it, Joe Satriani, Larry Carlton, Les Paul, Santana. You name 'em. Over 300-400 people have covered that song. Some of the great artists.

Q - In 1965 you recorded an all instrumental album of Beatle songs. That album went number one. Did The Beatles know about that album? Did you ever meet The Beatles or receive a phone call from any of them?

A - No, we didn't, but we knew their people so we got permission to put their pictures on the cover of the album.

Q - When you say "people," are you referring to The Beatles' manager, Brian Epstein?

A - No. Their lawyers. So, they took care of the business too, but ironically one of the songs we recorded, "And I Love Her" in 1965, it became a number one hit in Mexico for twenty-one weeks. We were down in Mexico and they actually thought that The Beatles copied us because we had distribution and they didn't. The time they let our album out there, The Beatles still didn't have distribution in Mexico. We did. It's funny how through the years a lot of people still believe until today that The Beatles copied us because we came out first with "And I Love Her". It's amazing the reception (we received). We were hired for two weeks and came back three months later. We were packin' the venues. People couldn't get in. Every night they were packed in. Unbelievable, the success we had there.

Q - You were also doing tours in Australia and Europe. Was that has headliners or a support group?

A - Headliners. In England, Mexico and Australia we were part of a tour. The Diamonds were on the tour.

Q - Was Europe more receptive to your music than anywhere else?

A - I found that in Europe the people were more geared to sitting down and listening. They're more geared to the music factor 'cause you can see in the United States if you watch those P.B.S. specials when they sell the CDs and see all the acts, you know what I'm talking about.

Q - I do know what you're talking about.

A - Have you ever seen an instrumental act on that show?

Q - I don't believe I ever have. They're all singing.

A - That's it! So, that's the indication and mentality of the people in charge. They really, I hate to say it, this is where the truth is, they don't give recognition to the instrumentalists and the instrumentalists played a major part. We had "Tequila". We had "Summer Place". We had "More". You know, you name em. There were so many people out there. The Ventures, Duane Eddy. You didn't see instrumental acts on any of these shows I've been doing all these years. I am the only instrumental act on the venue. I have never met another instrumentalist on the same venue or any venues. I don't see any.

Q - Now that you mention it, in the mid-1960s you had Al Hirt with "Java".

A - Right.

Q - And Herb Alpert And The Tijuana Brass was outselling The Beatles at one point. You heard instrumentals on the radio all the time. Now, you hear nothing.

A - Right. I think it's the mentality of the people in charge. The other thing that really turns me off is when I see these make believe groups. The people pass away and that's the end of the story. Don't get these guys up there just 'cause somebody bought the name and they put people who are not the real deal. But that's the business. "Sleep Walk" is going to be sixty years old next year (2019) and I thought about it the other day when I did a Malt Shop Cruise and people were so enthusiastic about my playing they'd say, "How come you're not on TV on that P.B.S. thing?" I said, "Well, they don't have any instrumentalists on there." But it gave me the idea to try and get a 60th Anniversary of a "Sleep Walk" tour, to try and get some of these guys who really have names like Brian Setzer, who won a Grammy for it or Joe Satriani or Larry Carlton, and do a "Sleep Walk" tour. I think it would be very successful to do an instrumentalists tour, all instrumental tour. Nobody's ever done that. Nobody's ever done an instrumental tour.

Q - You should run with that idea!

A - It's a good idea. I'm gonna try to move forward with it and see if I'm successful with it.

Q - And I hope you are! I wanted to ask you earlier, how did life change for you when "Sleep Walk" went to number one? I know you did the TV shows, but what else happened?

A - Well, we went on tour. A mid-West tour. The first time we were out of New York. It was like very strange. We were on a tour bus, not a glamorous tour bus, but like a school bus. Maybe we'd go 200 miles and then get a flat tire and we'd have to pull over to the side of the road and then unload our instruments so the guy can get the spare tire. It was really not the most accommodating situation, but we didn't know any better. That was it. You got on the bus. You live out of your suitcase and maybe every second day they'd find a place where you can sleep in a hotel and get your clothes cleaned if you had a chance and that was it. I did bring a lot of deodorant to spray the bus up when I started to learn. I used to buy those little things you hang in the car and I used to hang 'em up where I'd be sitting. I couldn't take it.

Q - Was that the Dick Clark Caravan Of Stars tour?

A - No. It was the G.A.C.

Q - General Artists Corporation tour.

A - Yeah.

Q - I think Frank Barsalona was with G.A.C. at the time. Does that name ring a bell?

A - That doesn't really ring a bell.

Q - He would go on to form Premier Talent.

A - Premier Talent I've heard of, sure.

Q - Frank Barsalona started Premier Talent because he didn't like the way Rock 'n' Roll acts were being treated.

A - We were like cattle.

Q - You have your own record label these days? Just for your music?

A - Yeah. Aniraf. Inc. Farina backwards.

Official Website: www.SantoAndJohnny.com

© Gary James. All rights reserved.