he starred as a faddishly-dressed beat rebel and singer, was shown on a third- season episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000. The show also riffed the 1959 film Girls Town, in which Contino appeared with other musical performers, such as Paul Anka and The Platters. He continued to perform regularly throughout the United States. His repertoire was eclectic, ranging from Italian songs such as "Come Back to Sorrento" and "Arrivederci Roma" to standards like "Lady of Spain" and "Swinging on a Star". Personal life Contino was married to Leigh Snowden for 26 years. They had three children together. They lived in Las Vegas. Novella and other fictional works James Ellroy wrote a novella, Dick Contino's Blues, which is a mini-memoir and crime story based on Contino's experiences as a struggling artist after the war. It is included in the 1994 Ellroy short story collection Hollywood Nocturnes. A version appeared in issue number 46 of Granta magazine (Winter 1994) along with several photographs of Contino and the author. Ellroy also penned a short story entitled Hollywood Shakedown, which appeared in his collected work "Crime Wave" and featured Contino as the central character. The story was entirely fictitious as it features numerous incidents of violence and murder which Contino had never been linked with or accused of in reality. He appeared briefly in Ellroy's American Tabloid, the first book of his Underworld USA Trilogy, performing at a mafia-financed Cuban exile military training camp ("Contino played 'Lady Of Spain' six thousand times."). In 2012, a biography of Contino's life, The Beauty of Imperfection, was published. Death Contino died on April 19, 2017, in Fresno, at the age of 87. References External links Dick Contino Interview NAMM Oral History Library (2006) 1930 births 2017 deaths American accordionists RCA Victor artists Musicians from Fresno, California People from the Las Vegas Valley