Frank Scott (musician)

Frank Scott (June 21, 1921 – October 1995) was an American musician and arranger that was a member of the Lawrence Welk orchestra. His instruments were the piano and the harpsichord.

Born in Fargo, North Dakota; he first took up the piano at age eight, and by the time he was twelve, he led his first band and started to arrange songs. He originally attended North Dakota Agricultural College after high school, but after a year he left when he decided to pursue a career in music. He was the music director at radio station WDAY in Fargo from 1944 to 1956 where he scored over 2,500 arrangements for the station while composing music for community theater groups and conducting local ice shows.

In 1956, bandleader Lawrence Welk asked him to join his orchestra and his nationwide television show. He appeared on the The Lawrence Welk Show playing piano and harpsichord during his tenure on the show until 1969. He also worked behind the scenes of the Welk show as an arranger, assisted the production staff and furnished programming ideas. Scott also arranged thousands of songs and recorded albums in his own right for Coral and Dot Records. He left the show and then moved back to Fargo with his wife, where he continued to work in music, organized a big band, and taught a course at North Dakota State University for a year plus continued to arrange music.

By the late 1970s, he moved back to California and formed his own orchestra, which he led until he died in October 1995. By that time, he lived in Palm Desert and had arranged over 7,000 songs in his entire career.

Scott was married to his first wife, Janette Daniels Scott from 1940 until her death in 1979; they had four children, Douglas, Sally, Todd and Frank lll. His second wife, Audrey Roseland, worked for Scott when they were at WDAY in Fargo during the 1940s. They were married from 1993 until his death.

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  • VIAF: 43516499
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Name Scott, Frank
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Date of birth June 21, 1921
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Date of death 1995
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Famous quotes containing the words frank and/or scott:

    When I was your age I went to bed right after supper. Sometimes I went to bed before supper. Sometimes I went without supper and didn’t go to bed at all.
    S.J. Perelman, U.S. screenwriter, Bert Kalmar, Harry Ruby, and Norman Z. McLeod. Groucho Marx, Horsefeathers, a wisecrack made to his son Frank (Zeppo Marx)

    What lies behind facts like these: that so recently one could not have said Scott was not perfect without earning at least sorrowful disapproval; that a year after the Gang of Four were perfect, they were villains; that in the fifties in the United States a nothing-man called McCarthy was able to intimidate and terrorise sane and sensible people, but that in the sixties young people summoned before similar committees simply laughed.
    Doris Lessing (b. 1919)