Leo "Zeke" Manners (October 10, 1911 - October 14, 2000) was an American country musician.

Life and career

Manners was born in San Francisco but raised in Los Angeles, where he attended Fairfax High School and learned to play fiddle, banjo, and piano. He played in a traveling revue for a time before joining several Western swing groups. In the 1930s he came to lead a group called The Beverly Hill Billies, who were a popular radio attraction long before the TV show of the same name became a hit. Manners's show, featuring himself on accordion and organ, mixed comedy with Western Swing and was broadcast on Los Angeles's KMPC as well as in New York City. He covered ''Mr. Ghost Goes to Town'' which was written in 1936 by Will Hudson,

Irving Mills Irving Harold Mills (born Isadore Minsky; January 16, 1894 – April 21, 1985) was an American music publisher, musician, lyricist, and jazz artist promoter. He sometimes used the pseudonyms Goody Goodwin and Joe Primrose. Personal Mills was ...

and Mitchell Parish. The Five Jones Boys also performed the song. The ensemble played for several years together before breaking up, after which Manners put together the group Zeke & the City Fellers. This band played on New York radio and did a tour of Europe shortly before the outbreak of World War II. In the 1940s he hosted his own One Man Variety Show, a comedy/musical routine, and in the 1950s he hosted music programs on Los Angeles's KFWB and New York's

WINS WINS may refer to: *WINS (AM), an all-news radio station in New York City *WINS-FM, a radio station in New York City *World Institute for Nuclear Security *Windows Internet Name Service *WINS (solution stack), a set of software subsystems *Wireles ...

. Later in his career, Manners performed some

stand-up comedy Stand-up comedy is a comedy, comedic performance to a live audience in which the performer addresses the audience directly from the stage. The performer is known as a comedian, a comic or a stand-up. Stand-up comedy consists of One-line joke ...

and ran his own mail order business. He had cameo roles in the films '' Real Life'' and '' Lost in America'', both of which starred his nephew

Albert Brooks Albert Brooks (born Albert Lawrence Einstein ; July 22, 1947) is an American actor and filmmaker. He received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor for 1987's '' Broadcast News'' and was widely praised for his performance as a ...

; he also appeared in the 1987 film ''

Barfly Barfly may refer to: * ''Barfly'' (album), 1995 album by the band Buck-O-Nine * Barfly (club), a music venue in Camden Town, London, UK * ''Barfly'' (film), 1987 American film starring Mickey Rourke and Faye Dunaway * Barfly, a bar in Montreal o ...

''. Manners was the author of over 100 songs, including "

The Pennsylvania Polka "Pennsylvania Polka" is a polka song written in the United States in 1942. The song was written by Lester Lee and Zeke Manners, and published by Shapiro, Bernstein & Co. It became an almost immediate hit for The Andrews Sisters. Frankie Yank ...

" (best known as a hit by The Andrews Sisters and the Frankie Yankovic version, which made frequent appearances in ''

Groundhog Day Groundhog Day ( pdc, Grund'sau dåk, , , ; Nova Scotia: Daks Day) is a popular North American tradition observed in the United States and Canada on February 2. It derives from the Pennsylvania Dutch superstition that if a groundhog emerges from ...

''), "

Take My Wife, Please Henry "Henny" Youngman (16 March 1906 – 24 February 1998) was a British-born American comedian and musician famous for his mastery of the " one-liner", his best known being "Take my wife... please". In a time when many comedians told ela ...

" (a hit for Henny Youngman), and "Los Angeles" (best known in its version by

Les Paul Lester William Polsfuss (June 9, 1915 – August 12, 2009), known as Les Paul, was an American jazz, country, and blues guitarist, songwriter, luthier, and inventor. He was one of the pioneers of the solid-body electric guitar, and his prototype ...

). He worked frequently with Buddy Ebsen, who went on to become

Jed Clampett ''The Beverly Hillbillies'' is an American television sitcom that was broadcast on CBS from 1962 to 1971. It had an ensemble cast featuring Buddy Ebsen, Irene Ryan, Donna Douglas, and Max Baer Jr. as the Clampetts, a poor, backwoods family fro ...

on the ''Beverly Hillbillies'' show.

Discography

Singles

References

*Greg Prato,

Zeke Manners Leo "Zeke" Manners (October 10, 1911 - October 14, 2000) was an American country musician. Life and career Manners was born in San Francisco but raised in Los Angeles, where he attended Fairfax High School (Los Angeles), Fairfax High School and ...

at Allmusic {{DEFAULTSORT:Manners, Zeke 1911 births 2000 deaths American country singer-songwriters Singer-songwriters from California RCA Victor artists 20th-century American singers Country musicians from California