SONNY’S ENCORE, by Michael BrackenOn a cool Tuesday evening in September 1935, much of the adult population of Granbury, Texas, came out to see Sonny Goodman and His Orchestral All-Stars, paying twenty-five cents a head to watch the seventeen-piece band perform the most popular swing tunes of the day. The band leader, a female vocalist, and a bus driver rounded out the twenty-member traveling troupe, which performed several nights a week throughout the Southwest.
Shortly after midnight, as the musicians gathered their charts, packed their instruments, and broke down their music stands, Sonny presented each of them with their share of that evening’s take.
Two dollars.
He kept the rest to cover expenses—fuel for the bus, the printing of handbills, pay for the advance man who preceded them
