DANCE BAND LEADER

Greymouth Evening Star, 28 April 1937, Page 8

DANCE BAND LEADER

FORCED INTO BANKRUPTCY. A dance band leader, Bert Firman, sleek and handsome, who was once earning £7OO a week, appeared in the London Bankruptcy Court on March 23, as Herbert Feuerman. owing £447, with no assets. He admitted extravagant living and said: “I spent £3O a week on clothes. My personal expenses were £lo'o h week. I lost £2OOO in one week on Wall Street. I lost thousands at Monte Carlo —I can remember gambling £600.” Bert Firman carried an ivory-tipped malacca cane, wore a smartly-tailored coat, a blue and white striped shirt. “I hate to admit it,” he said, “but I was once called the best-dressed, band leader in Europe. I set fashion in America/ I wore a white carnation

with tails, a red carnation with a dinner jacket. Everyone followed.” “I never spent less than 35/- on a shirt; I bought ties by the dozen; I had lovely jewellery. All my underwear was made to measure. “When I was 17 I had my own band, was earning £25 a week. At 19 my salary doubled . . . then soared to £lOO a week. It was difficult not to be extravagant at that age with so much money at hand. Then Mayfair took me up. I played at private parties. The Duke of Windsor often engaged me when he was Prince of Wales.” Bert Firman once had an adoring fan mail. He played the violin. His dark crisply waved hair brush-

ed stiffly to his head, a thin moustache, white even teeth, brought letters from love-sick women,” “But I never he said, “although lovely girls were all round me. I met the prettiest girls all the time. It made me blase about women.” He played at the Dorchester, the Carlton and the Metropole Hotels, broadcast for the 8.8. C., recorded for H.M.V. “I never stopped spending—l lived to the hilt. In 1927 I earned more than £lO,OOO. “Whenever I went to the Riviera, I gambled heavily—that “was up to 1934.

In the last three years my. earnings were only £1500; my personal and travelling expenses alone were £l7OO. My tailor’s bill was £6O. “I have still kept up my reputation for being well dressed—on a smaller scale, of course. I saw no reason for turning up at the bankruptcy court in rags. I dressed carefully.” Bert Firman will get another band together, stay in England, try to get on top again.