Beau Lee

Singer, journeyman drummer and road manager of the Spike Jones City Slickers, which he joined in 1943. He began his professional musical career touring in the Everett Hoagland Band, which played the historic Rendezvous Ballroom in Balboa, California (where Stan Kenton was also one of the sidemen.) Beau Lee became a popular drummer for a variety of groups that worked in that venue. Lee came off the drums to participate in several vocal skits, but by far his most famous performance was as Italian dictator Benito Mussolini in the film Meet the People. At the time, Beau Lee was also working the third shift at the Vega aircraft plant doing wartime defense production.