His voice has turned this ex-athlete into a big business;
yet, at 24, he's too
worried about
the "precarious" future
even to think about marriage
By ROBERT PEER
Recently, Johnny Mathis' manager, Helen Noga,
sat her client down with a battery of attor
neys and accountants to fill him in on the various
Mathis enterprises.
Mrs. Noga was pleased when she noticed that
"for the first time Johnny was taking an active in
terest in his finances; he was figuring with a pen
cil and paper as the conference progressed. Finally,
his lawyer asked, "Johnny, do you have any idea
how much money you're worth?"
"Oh, about $50,000, I guess," replied Mathis.
"You're worth more than $1 million," the attor
ney informed him.
The curious manager took another look at
Johnny's "figures." They weren't calculations after
all. Johnny had been working on a song arrange
ment throughout the get-together.
This doesn't mean Johnny's casual about success
or money. Just the opposite. He's perpetually wor
w ried that the bonanza won't last, and his every
waking moment is devoted to working for a more
golden future. The way things are going for him
now, it's hard to understand why this youthful
overnight success should view every tomorrow as
a personal enemy.
More than 20,000 Johnny Mathis records are sold
every day. His growing legion of teen-age fans has
carried a dozen tunes over the million mark.
Johnny has adult appeal, too, as indicated by his
'album-soles. More than three-quarters of a million
albums have been sold, an all-time sales mark,
according to Columbia Records. He's in big de
mand for TV shows, too, and appears on Frances
Langford's NBC special this evening (Sunday).
Moreover, Johnny has branched out to where he
now owns five music publishing companies and two
apartment houses in Manhattan. "And there's a
lot of other jazz I can't think of right now," he adds.
Johnny's success results from three ingredients:
His own talent an exciting, pleasing voice.
His constant self-analysis.
Helen Noga, the manager who has guided his
oaieer since 1955.
Johnny gives Connie Cox, a San Francisco voice
teacher, most 'of the credit for developing his
talent. He always had an unusual voice with a
phenomenal range for a male singer. His father,
Clement Mathis, recognized this when Johnny was
13 and took him to Mist; Cox.
"With seven children to supiKirt," Johnny re
calls, "Dad couldn't afford to pay for lessons on
his salary as chauffeur and maintenance man,
' even with Mom helping out as a cook and maid."
But Misjj Cox, whom Johnny calls a "wonder
fully generous woman," recognized the great po-
O '
M Family Weekly. Muy I. IMO
r i x i
m m
THEMIL1I0N-
DOLLAR WOES
OF
JOHNNY
math
i
; ;t-
tential in him and taught him without fee for
seven years.
Johnny's first public fame came-not as a singer
but as a high jumper in high school, and again at
San Francisco State College. One of the best all
around athletes in the city high-school system,
Johnny also was an all-city basketball player.
- He paid for his two years of college not with
athletic scholarships, however, but with his voice.
"I picked up a number of scholarships, most of
them sponsored by women's clubs," Johnny recalls.
"They were for about $50 each, but together they
paid for tuition, books, and other essentials."
Johnny had his mind set on becoming a physical
education instructor until the night in 1955 when
he went to a San Francisco night club owned by
Helen and George Noga and was asked to sing.
"When I heard him," says Helen, "I told my hus
band, 'This boy is going to be bigger than Nat King
Cole. All he needs is a push.' " Helen has pro
vided that push, parlaying him from $75 a week
into a million-dollar-a-year property.
Yet, at 24, Johnny is worried that it won't last.
"I've already been at the top longer than my pre
monition told me I would," he declares. That's why
Johnny has insured his future with an annuity that
will pay him $1 million when he's 40. And his pub
lishing companies are potential Mathis gold mines.
As Johnny explains it, "If I hadn't gone into music
publishing, I'd only be collecting on my records.
Now when somebody brings me a song and I re
cord it, I sometimes publish it, too. Then I get the
record royalties plus royalties from my own pub
lishing houses."
Johnny's preoccupation with self-analysis is an
other form of insurance against a cloudy future.
When I went to see him in his Spanish-type Bev
erly Hills mansion, for example, I found him
listening intently to records Mathis records.
He was hearing himself, not to please his ego,
he told me, but to evaluate his own performance.
"I listen to myself to analyze my voice, my tech
nique, and myself. When I'm not analyzing my
own records, 1 do the same with other singers I
like." This practice, Johnny feels, keeps him in the
form necessary to stay on top longer.
Johnny says he was "sort of engaged" once but
has no plans now for getting married. "Plenty of
girls try to get next to me," Johnny says, "and
some of them manage to meet me and we become
good friends. But that's all, so far.
"Besides," says Johnny, the worrier, "I feel it's
better for my career if I don't get married right
way. When you deal with the public, you're al
ways in a precarious position."
.4... -