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Many acts play the Hollywood Palace, the The Today Show? Such appearances are few and far between.
Rarer still are Today specials, and these are traditionally built around the likes of Beatrice Lillie, Noel Coward or Richard Rodgers. The big brass of show business.
But on Monday (7:00-9:00 AM), Today will pay an hour-long tribute to the newly-arrived Cowsills, a singing act which is, in a sense, A Today Show baby.
The Cowsills made their national television debut on Today in September, 1964, after a vacationing Today writer heard them sing in a hotel in their home town, Newport, Rhode Island.
Bud Cowsill, a 20-year Navy veteran, now retired, organized the group featuring his wife and five of their seven children.
Since their first Today stint, the Cowsills have sold a million records of their hit song, "The Rain, The Park and Other Things" sung on the Tonight Show, and played two of 10 contracted engagements this season on The Ed Sullivan Show.
The onstage Cowsill family consists of Susie, eight, her brothers, Bill, 20, Bob, 18, Barry, 13, Johnny, 11, and their mother, Barbara. Susie and Barbara are new recruits, having joined the act only a few months ago.
Two other Cowsill sons, Paul, 16, and Dick, who is Bob's twin, are the singers' stage and road managers.
"The kids love to perform, and everybody gets in on the act," Cowsill explains, "either as a singer or behind-the-scenes."
Most fathers worry about their family breaking up as the children grow older and leave home, but Bud Cowsill is not one of them. "Our family, I'm glad to say," he reports, "wants to stay together, and that just fine with me.
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