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"Super Star" is a title invented by the Madison Avenue/Television Network complex who set our standards in the world today. They went as far as they could go with the "Star" billing, so they moved it up to "Super Star."
There is only one real way to tell who is a Super Star and who isn't, and that's by the level of the people willing to buy said personality. You can be the greatest, technique-wise, but until your name is up in the right set of lights, you don't count for much among the in crowd.
Norm Nielsen has floated violins at the Riviera and the Dunes, in Las Vegas, Harrah's, Lake Tahoe, the Nugget, Sparks, Nevada. He has delighted audiences with his tuned coin ladder at the Savoy in London, the Casino de Paris, the Tivoli in Copenhagen, the Fiskartorpet in Helsinki, the Neraida in Athens, and the Tamanaco Hotel in Caracas. Everybody who is anybody makes it a point to be seen at the Crazy Horse in Paris, and incidentally to watch the show. Norm Nielsen played that show several times, and has only to agree, to play it again. And what about Tito's -- called the most beautiful club in Europe? The international audience flocks to Tito's, (in Palma, Majorca) because the rest of the beautiful people of the world flock there. This particular show they enjoy very much because it is so unique. The back wall of the restaurant lowers at show time, and the blue Mediterranean, stretching for miles, becomes the back drop of the stage. Norm Nielsen caught fans of cards on that stage, floated
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and vanished the violin, produced handfuls of coins to pour into the tinkling coin ladder, and for one enchanted moment, played his silver flute and vanished it in a shower of sparkle. None of the magnificent clubs he played outdid him in showmanship, splendor of performance, and appeal to the international set. Which is why he could spend the rest of his career moving from one to the other, always in demand, always to the sound of applause.
That, dear reader, is being a Super Star, and it doesn't come easily. In fact, there is no real formula. Even Norm doesn't know quite, how he did it -- but here's the story.
Kenosha, Wisconsin, is about 75 miles north of Chicago, right on the lake. Norm Nielsen (it's his real, legal name) was born there on February 17th, 1934. His father was a Danish baker in a day when "Danish" was not synonymous with sugar buns from a Jewish delicatessen. Mr. Nielsen came from three generations of bakers working in Denmark. He broke the chain by stowing away on a ship to America, where he immediately became a baker. When he married and had children, it was in the old tradition that they too should become bakers.
As a boy, Norm obediently took his turn working before and after school at his father's bakery, along with his brothers. He was now a fourth generation baker and should have been more than content. Actually, he hated it sincerely, and longed for the day he could
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