Martha Samuelson

Martha Samuelson, 98, passed away peacefully at Wesley Acres Community on Wednesday, January 8, 2014. Martha will be missed by those who surrounded her with love like family, which includes the fine staff at Wesley Acres Health Center, 2nd Floor. Our gratitude is unending for their years of love and care.

Martha is remembered as the pianist of the Samuelson Trio, one of the longest running acts playing at The Des Moines Club - a four week booking that lasted nearly 25 years. The Samuelson Trio, with her husband Sam, (who died Nov. 3, 2002) on drums, Martha on piano and Bob Schiller on bass, played Saturday nights and on special occasions at the club from January 1971 to May 1995.

The Trio also played for many different functions, including receptions for President Gerald Ford and Vice President Nelson Rockefeller; the opening of Terrace Hill as Iowa’s governor’s residence, hosted by Gov. Robert Ray; opening of the Tower Medical Clinic at the University of Osteopathic Medicine and Health Sciences (now Des Moines University), where U.S. Sen. Bob Dole of Kansas remarked to Martha, “This is my kind of music.” The Trio played popular standards and show tunes. Early on, the trio played at the old Standard Club in the Polk County Savings and Loan Association building at 7th and High Streets.

Martha worked at Drake University in the accounting office from 1962-1982.

The former Martha Rust was born in Memphis, Tenn., Dec. 19, 1915. When she was 2 years old, the family moved from Akron, Ohio, where at 6 years of age she started piano lessons. She appeared on Akron radio station WDAC Saturday afternoons on a program with children performers. She graduated to a Saturday night radio program as a teenager as piano player for the group, “A Bunch of Boys,” musicians playing requests called in by listeners. If the “Boys” did not know the song requested, Martha did. She had good training learning to read music and play by ear. One of her piano teachers played in the pit orchestra of the Akron Vaudeville Theater. Each week she had to play, for her lesson, the “book” of music from the different acts the theater used for their performances. She was a valued musician, gaining vast knowledge during that golden age of stage shows.

Martha played various spots in the Midwest (in Cleveland, Ohio, she was with the group, “Three Men and a Gal”), and in New York and Pennsylvania. She played the Jamestown Hotel in Jamestown, NY, and the Kane Hotel in Kane, PA, where she met Everett A. “Sam” Samuelson, a drummer working the vaudeville circuits.

Martha and Sam were married and moved to his home town of Bradford, PA, where Sam had played the popular Brook Club with George Jackson Quartet and backed performers early in their careers before they became nationally known, such as singers Patti Page and Eileen Barton and comedian Alan King.

After Sam got tired of jobbing around in the band business, he joined the Pennsylvania based Kendall Oil Co, and was transferred to Des Moines in 1957 as a district manager. When the Samuelson’s moved to Des Moines, local band leader and booker, Don Hoy, learned of their talents and booked them around town and eventually into The Des Moines Club.

One of the many musicians and performers the Samuelson’s got to know over the years was big band singer, Russ Carlyle, who sang with “Blue Barron’s Orchestra” before forming his own band. When Carlyle appeared at the Val Air Ballroom, he did not know the Samuelson’s were living in Des Moines, so Martha surprised him at the bandstand and he exclaimed, “Martha, what are you doing here!”

Martha’s son Gary Samuelson, Orlando, FL, also an accomplished musician, predeceased her on November 21, 2008. He had two children, Morgan and Mitchell. A music scholarship has been established in memory of Gary who was a Drake University graduate. In lieu of flowers, memorials can be made to the Gary Samuelson Scholarship, Drake University Alumni & Development, 2507 University Avenue, Des Moines, IA 50311.

A private service will be planned for a later date.

Let’s hear a big round of applause one more time for Martha at the piano!

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