Frank Samson and the Wailers

Cleveland, 1958-64?

Often regarded as Cleveland’s first Rock & Roll band. Not sure if that’s accurate but the group was the late 50s launch pad for a young guitar whiz from Euclid, Glenn Schwartz. Glenn had absorbed raw, blues guitar firsthand hanging around Cleveland's rough blues bars. He quickly became a focal point of Samson’s group with his fiery lead guitar playing. His signature song was "Rock The House", a song that was supposedly recorded but never released. We’d sure love to hear it! Despite their local popularity, Frank Samson & The Wailers never released a record of their own. They did appear as the backing group on a single by would-be teen idol Denny Rafkin in 1962, apparently without Schwartz. Samson later surfaced as a member of The Sounds Of 3 with a single on the Clevetown label. Manny Paris was the sax player.