Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Steven Lombardo . We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Hi Steven, thanks for joining us today. When did you first know you wanted to pursue a creative/artistic path professionally?

When witnessing an entertainer at Chicago fest many years ago who was riding a giraffe unicycle while escaping a straitjacket with wild hair.

My cousin knew him personally and invited me to go back stage to meet and talk with him. He taught me how to juggle and showed me his box truck with a large wardrobe, a small table with lights around it, a penny farthing and several stage props.

I was amazed and excited that one was able to do “fun” for a living.

Steven, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

My cousin was living in St Petersburg, Florida working at a German restaurant called the OomPah Pah. I was working at a bank in Chicago at the time and visited him while on vacation. He asked if I wanted to work while I was on vacation. I said no, I want to hang out at the beach. He explained it would be at night and my job would be taking a cover charge from guests, making popcorn and dancing the polka and waltz with the ladies. I told him that I don’t know how to dance, he said he would teach me. So he did and I did.

Now in the band, the accordion player was building a German restaurant in Tampa at the time. The Matterhorn Hauf Brau Haus. I went back to Chicago and my cousin asked if I’d like to move to Florida. Yes, of course, that’d be great.

He was convincing Hans, the owner of the restaurant that I would be a great guy for entertaining the guests. He explained I ride unicycles and juggled and that I was the same guy that danced with the ladies at the Oom Pah Pah.

Well he did convince him. I moved in with him and started working the day after we arrived. The place hadn’t opened yet so he had me help build the dance floor, the stage. He taught me how to do electric, plumbing, carpentry.

He purchased a double decker bus and we would go to Octoberfests in small nearby towns. I would get paid much better doing these hugs than he gad been paying me as a worker doing difficult tasks and hard labor and I realized the gigs were much better than the labor part of my life.

The restaurant opened in December of 1980 and while I was helping him work on the place he would have me practice playing songs on a set of cowbells that had two full octaves. It was part of what I did for the show nightly. He also suggested I learn how to juggle while on the unicycle which I did. Another musician that worked there gave me a globe to learn to walk on. I learned the globe and how to juggle on the globe.

I put globe walking into the show. He taught me how to play the waltz, polka beat and rhumba on the drums so I could give the drummer his two breaks during the evening.

Many other talented people would come by to see the show and I was taught how to tight rope between two trees one night. We put that into the show, another night a guy came by and taught me how to eat fire, we put that into the show. Mario Zucchini , one of the first guys that got shot out of a cannon came by and taught me how to do some rope spinning tricks.

All this while developing my unicycle shows. One in the giraffe another on a small unicycle with a handlebar unit.

Hans, unfortunately was shot and killed by a robber in 1985. I was there with my wife when this happened. Not sure you want to have me talk about this. It’s kind of a downer part of my story but it helped push me to realize every one goes through tough things, dark times and helped me to take advantage of bringing smiles and laughter to people cuz we never know what people are going through but while we have them in our audience we get to help them forget for a short time and bring some joy into their lives.

I belong to The Florida Federation of Fairs and I book myself as 13 acts for the price of one. I can do stage shows or strolling. I do three different strolling acts each week day and four on weekends.

One of the things that I feel sets me apart is that I don’t do a whole lot of fairs so I still have a great love to do it. If I was to do eight months out of the year doing fairs back to back continuously, I feel that it would be more of a job rather than doing it with a live to bring laughter and smiles into peoples lives.

I am also in the process of having a children’s book illustrated by Eric Haines, a one man band. The book is about one of my characters that I do a strolling act with. Schmoozalino Valentino Lombardo. He’s a gondolier that rides in a gondola that’s attached to an electric longboard. In the book he works for. Pizza joint at the fairs called Spaghetti Eddies. He delivers pizzas to other workers at the fairs that are unable to leave their joint. One day he delivers a pizza to a magician who gives him a fake moustache that clips on his nose for bringing him his pizza nice and hot. Schmoozalino realizes when he wiggles his nose the moustache seems to dance beneath his nose. One day he starts wiggling it for some fair guests and realizes he left the ground and theirs magic in his moustache.. What?

I’m most proud of that at 62 years of age, I’m still doing what I love to do, that I’m in the best shape of my life and that I’ve been married to the same woman for 40 years!

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

Well, I believe the story of my boss, friend, fatherly figure and mentor Hans being shot at the restaurant one night and not feeling I could have anyone else play the “straight man” to my act.

One of the guys who was going to take his place during a night if my show asked for me to write out the show and he read it word for word like a fourth grader reading g a story, enunciating every word. I was shocked and wasn’t sure how it was going to go so I decided to say my lines the same way, like a fourth grader. The crowd realized what was going on and laughed harder than any other show I ever did there. What an incredibly fantastic night!

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

My goal is to encourage people to figure out what they love to do, no matter what that may be (to a certain extent), and figure out a way that they can do it as often as they like with getting a paycheck for doing it. Even if they can do it on the weekends so they can fill that void of living life to its fullest extent. Because I do t think anyone can be truly happy unless they’re doing what they were created in this life to do.

I believe we all have a reason and a purpose in this life and if we don’t figure out what it is we can never truly be content with living in such a trying and difficult world.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: Fritzy brothers inc
• Facebook: Steven Lombardo
• Youtube: Fritzy brothers inc