I’ve been here seven years. I’ve got 40 years in the world of organ marketing–as in musical instrument as opposed to kidneys. That’s at every level: wholesale, manufacturing. I have been coming here since 1970 and began working here in February of ’95. I can look through the crowd and see 30 minutes’ worth of tunes because I know what they want to hear. I enjoy Duke Ellington, show tunes, songs associated with singers–Sinatra, Bennett, Nat King Cole. I don’t do any rock and roll–there’s no melody line, no chord structures, it’s so monotone. If I do need to take a break, I’ve made up discs so I can go pee while I play! It is me; I’ve just recorded it. I’m like the Energizer bunny. I keep going and going. That’s why I wear bunny slippers under the piano–but nobody gets to see them (I’m just kidding about the slippers). Nobody would know if I wore my pants. One night a man sitting in front of me had a few drinks and said, “You sound a lot like Tony Bennett.” I said, “Have another Mai Tai and I’ll sound like Sinatra.” The hostess will ask me to sing when she needs tables!
–Stan Zimmerman, piano bar musician