[Dixielandjazz] Mafia story

[TCASHWIGG at aol.com]

Maybe they were maybe they wern't, I didn't ask.  The money was Green and 
enough of it that I did not have to work at all for the next five years.

As some of you know I had a project back in 1990 to buy American Acts and 
produce 200 concerts in Italy during the World Cup Soccer Playoffs.  No formal 
written contract existed.

It was a very interesting 90 days of my life and a lot of fun as well.

All the folks I met in Sicily said the Mafia was in Rome, and all the Guys in 
Rome told me the Mafia was in Sicily.

At one point, I got a 9 figure cashier's check in Lire, from the bank of 
Sicily which much to my surprise had to be sent to New York to be cashed, hummm,  
go figure, I asked no questions just sat around Rome and enjoyed myself for 
thirty days waiting for the cash to arrive.

I got escorted all over Sicily in Mercedes 450 SL's and when I went to the 
banks to get cash to complete some of the concert payouts I had more friends 
than I had ever imagined follow me down the streets, wait for me in my hotel 
lobby, hanging around the parking garage, and even watch my brown paper bag full 
of American Cash lying on the couch in the hotel lobby while we checked in each 
new act.

I never felt safer in my life, Hell I felt like the President with all those 
FBI guys hanging around.  In a six month period of fulfilling this contract, I 
never once met whoever signed the contract, but when I got a phone call to 
proceed with the next transaction it never failed to happen.  I joked with one 
of my associates one day in Sicily, and said you know this has been a great 
gig, I could just get on that plane and go straight back to the USA with ALL the 
do re mi.  He said yep you sure could, but I would not want to live in your 
house, as a matter of fact I would not want to live on the same street you do, 
:))

Don't know if they were Mafioso or just upscale Italian Business men but the 
deals all went down and a lot of good American acts made a lot of money.  I 
got called to a major meeting one night to a Cathedral way out in the middle of 
nowhere, where I met a couple of well dressed gentlemen who asked me to get 
into the back seat of a sleek Mercedes to go for a ride to get paid for the 
gospel tour I had just finished. 

  I will admit that made me a bit nervous for a few minutes, but not only did 
they pay me in cash, that was when they told me I was getting the contract 
for the World Cup tour, because they liked the way I did business and delivered 
everything I promised to do and the quality of my shows were better than 
anything they had bought before.

After that project was finished they all disappeared from the face of the 
earth, the companies I dealt with were all out of business and gone.  I have 
heard that one of our associates is now living and working major concerts in 
Budapest, Hungary, but I have not yet been able to find him or anyone who knows his 
whereabouts.

What made things really fun was that I had bought all these shows and three 
months after they were all set up they had Elections all over Italy, and when I 
got there to start the shows, none of the folks were in charge in the cities 
that were there when I organized the shows.  OOPs , now we fly by the seat of 
our pants, Chaos was a pleasant way to describe it and everything was 
IMPOSSIBLE, but somehow managed to get done, all the shows happened and all the folks 
got paid, got the plane tickets, the hotels were all happy and there were no 
problems that were not taken care of immediately.


The tour was even more fascinating for me because I was reading a book in my 
down time in travels called "The Sicilian" and sleeping and eating in the very 
towns in the book,  I was actually reading a chapter one day while having 
lunch in a small restaurant outside Palermo, I suddenly realized that I was 
sitting in the restaurant in the book where a group of guys came over the short ivy 
covered wall to my left and shotguns blasted four unfortunate fellows at the 
table where I was sitting.


Cheers,

Tom