1963 Rat Pack Concert Poster

Product Description

In 1963, and still at the height of their popularity as a sort of single entity, the main members of the Rat Pack performed a benefit concert in Santa Monica, California. Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin, at the behest of fellow Rat Packer Sammy Davis, Jr., appeared to benefit the NAACP, C.O.R.E. and Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Southern Christian Leadership Conference as part of the “Stars for Freedom” series of benefits. The concert was to be held at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium on November 25, 1963, and the Count Basie Orchestra was to have been the musical accompaniment. Unfortunately, and as any student of history knows, President Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas on November 22, 1963, and the concert, like almost everything else in America, was postponed until that December. Basie couldn’t make the new date, and was replaced by a band of LA studio pros hastily assembled and led by arranger Nelson Riddle. Ultimately, the concert raised almost $70,000.00 for these then-critical causes. The poster here is a re-creation of the original that appeared in the window of LA record stores, and contains the add-on printer’s snipe that announced the show’s postponement. We have no idea what an actual poster from the original print run would cost today, but we imagine it would fetch a fortune. These re-makes, however, are affordable tributes to the swingin’est guys in the Universe, the Rat Pack.