The Singing Spy

Bob recently told me an interesting anecdote about the "Bonanza" episode. He went to guitair legend Lauren Almeida (with whom Sammy Davis Jr. had recently done an album), to teach him the fingering on the guitar. However, Bob, did not do the actual playing.

The only other instance I know of him singing, other than that, was a recording he made of the civil rights anthem "I Have Climbed the Mountain", which he did for some TV show. The recording has been something of an inside family joke for years, as it was simply awful.

When Bob was to do his episode "The Swinger", which he wrote for the show "Cain's Hundred", playing Rat-Pack-like crooner Hank Shannon, he went to Sammy and asked him to teach him how to sing. Sammy had a better idea: he'd do the singing and Bob would lip-synch. Sammy did an amazing job of toning down his own signature voice, making it sound as if Robert Culp was suddenly possessed of an amazing singing voice. Ah, the magic of television!

So to answer your question, Dotterer, Jason and to a lesser degree, his brother Joe, came by their singing talents independently of their father.

MBF