You came out to catch a fish.

Got to have patience when you fish.

A lot of people don't have a patient to fish.

You just want to catch fish right away.

Put the ply on here.

Not a very good fly.

Kind of beat up one.

Hi.

My name Michael Crowley.

Okay, we're ready to go.

Here.

You fly a fish every day.

If I can usually go order Lake Hefner.

I say are you ready to catch fish.

Well, fishing you you're next to nature.

And just keep your mind free.

You can, relax.

It's fun catching fish and, just like.

Just like it.

One of my favorite hobbies.

You can get bass, wall eye you know, had a bite there, missed him.

Well, I'm considered pretty good.

I don't brag about myself, but, I mean, I never, never.

Come on.

You cannot always catch fish of some kind.

Sometimes you catch them, big one.

Sometimes I catch little ones, but I'll always catch a bunch of fish.

Always having fish on any given morning.

You can find Mike Crowley on the dock at Lake Hefner and find him bait.

Sometimes they don't.

A Ponca City boy practically born with the pole in his hand.

Yeah, I've been fishing.

Oh, ever since I was a child.

I used that fact.

I caught the first fish at Lake Ponca since then fished everyday Be nice if a Fish take a hold of it An 83 year old fisherman who elevates his hobby to an art.

Got one?

Nice.

Nice bluegill.

They're good eating.

Anybody watching?

Any fish?

If they see me out here and watch them fish.

So you come up, ask me, I'll give him to.

And if you find yourself nearby, you're likely to hear about the one that got away.

I like that, or the one that didn't.

Yeah.

Fish over there.

Several catfish said I got a hold.

Some took me all over the lake with a little 6 pound test line.

I don't know if you think that's a good story.

Wait till you hear this.

[singing] Make fishing good, but my opera better.

Hey.

[singing] You see, 60 years ago, this fisherman was an opera star.

Toh, tone.

They can't believe they say that.

Old man.

No way.

Old man with old roll.

He can't sing anything.

You just the old hillbilly honky tonk to night.

Open my mouth and say, oh, that's what happened.

Oh, what a beautiful mornin.

Oh, what a beautiful day.

I got a beautiful feeling every time.

Sometimes I fish and I just start singing.

Because I wanna do something.

And sometime people come by ask me to sing for them.

I’ll sing for them.

Fish and sing.

And I just have.

Have fun doing it.

I think for anybody, like I say, anytime they want me to sing I’ll sing for them.

Okay.

Thank you, thank you.

That’s what I live for, I get to make people happy.

Just have a good time.

That's amazing.

Beautiful, amazing.

Walking around the lake and hearing that Lake Hefner crashing.

He we’re having fun.

Yet.

New York City in the early 40s.

A Mecca for all sorts of performers from around the world Up.

And for a boy in Oklahoma with dreams as big as his voice My goal When I was in highschool was to be an opera singer.

In fact, in the year.

Book ahead, Mike, go to the concert stage today.

What the caption under my picture head.

I never really was a great singer.

I mean, I had a voice, but it wasn't a great voice calling me like, dad Bill, right?

That's what I paid from education.

And then that was really a very big break for me, where I learned music and learned all my languages and learned how to sing opera and so forth.

[singing] Cincinnati would be where Mike found his true voice.

[singing] He performed a season with the Cincinnati Summer opera.

There's a lot of fun at work, and, it required a lot of, sacrifice.

I mean, you didn't make a lot of money that you had that you had to just something about being on a stage singing the opera.

That's the satisfaction that you get from singing.

[singing] Becky, she snatched some rope.

You know that?

That started me off on a nice career with some of the other companies [singing] Soon, the El Reno High School graduate found himself in New York, touring America with the Metropolitan Opera and singing with the greats like Robert Merrill, Jan Pearson and everyone.

You could drink a meal on, off and, chord flatter Domingo and Pavarotti.

All the great fingers I've sung on a stage with them at Camp and Mario World.

It was quite a privilege yes it was.

I didn't quite have the star quality that they wanted, but I would.

I held my own pretty good so well that the young baritone won a contract that put him in the great opera houses of Europe, even one of the greatest in Italy.

And, of course, the English guy, you know, the 5 or 6 tiers high in the back.

And we didn't have any microphones, and you had to project.

It was a wonderful place to sing in.

And I did outdid myself.

When I sang the Rigoletto.

I did the best singing I'd ever done.

[singing] Well, like, after the performance that came out, they all came out and took their bow [singing] I came out last at the curtain call that aplaude walked off me, kept applauding, sent me out again.

Got more applause.

After that, I went back in.

It kept him funny.

And when that day he sent me out again.

Five times.

You sent me out on her stage and I said, this is something I never could not believe because very few singers get that make curtain call.

And then from there we went to Covent Garden.

In England.

I sang the La Traviata and and they.

Valentine, you found, after the performance.

And there was an elderly lady came up and had to move to Crawley.

That most beautiful version of that I've ever heard.

You did a very fine job.

Yeah.

Wonderful singer.

And then she turned around, left, and I didn't think anything of it when a guy came up to me, said, hey, Mike, you know who that was?

Who?

That was the Queen.

But I didn't know who the Queen at the time when she came up and complimented me THey told me who she was I about fell through the floor But that high would be short lived.

For this rising star.

You've.

Everything you have right now is taken away from you.

How would you feel now?

That way?

I feel like everything was taken away from me.

When he returned to America, Mike faced a string of bad luck staying in places of fire.

On 73rd Street.

There had burnt down burnt all my belongings and I just lost everything.

I had nothing left, manager that I had passed away.

Another man took her place and he didn't want to take on any more king I could.

He had his own and he wanted $5,000 to take me on.

And so I didn't had a $5,000 to do it.

No agent, no connection, no nothing, no money.

I slept in doorways to music, in boxes of newspapers, to keep warm.

I walked in the street to New York in February, January, February.

Ice cold weather it's just to bad to talk about.

I don't even like to talk about it.

Hurt and discouraged beyond belief, Mike found refuge at home.

He was in his 30s when he came back to Oklahoma to stay.

[singing] I feel like God want me to do some more singing.

So I went back and started singing again, watching the Tulsa Opera sing with a symphony orchestra.

Get him the role in the Madama Butterfly [music] Faith more than fate brought me back to Oklahoma.

When things get bad like that, you can overcome.

If you make up your mind, you're going to do it sometimes they bite Sometimes they don't.

I still enjoy singing today.

Singing with people.

For people.

A perch, I can say I'll sing anywhere, anytime for anybody.

All they got to do is ask me and I'll sing for them.

[singing] may have changed and his voice may have faded over time.

I'm not the singer.

I used to be.

But I'm still home.

I want to get most of them.

[singing] But audience response is still the same.

Thank you, thank you.

If I have an audience, fine.

If I don't have an audience, that's okay.

I'll still sing.

You talk about your man up, Gideon.

You talk about a man of soul.

But it doesn't look too good.

Old Joshua at the Battle of Jericho, I think.

Just for good.

For two persons.

A thousand.

No.

Let me keep warm.

Begin to blow, and the trumpet begin to sound.

Joshua commanded, that's what life is all about, you thing making other people happy.

And the world can come to know.

Oh, here we go.

Ha ha ha ha ha!

I think he's just a heartthrob.

He's handsome and he's all the ladies that come out here.

They say something about him, I think.

Beauty in old age.

Yeah, beauty in old age.

And he's awesome.

Thank you.

Oh thank you.

God bless you.

You are so.

awesome thank you very much.

I'll keep doing what?

Very much inspiration.

Beautiful weather.

Mike has spent the last 40 years giving the gift of music to other Oklahomans.

Taught voice to Christian music, here in Tulsa taught voice, first Southern Baptist Church in Dale city.

I've taught privately in my home, and I've taught in several churches around.

[singing] I go to nursing homes and sing for the people I get program from classical music.

[singing] Like the older people enjoy my kind of music better to the young people.

Young people don't have quite have a grasp of the classical music, and it's not as popular as it was.

[singing] You see, if one thing acting English up on the plow, my feet up on the thawed.

Another think acting Italian You're acting German.

Whatever you're singing, you got a big act in those languages.

[singing] Opera isdrama and new set to music.

Really drama set to music.

You don't.

Don't go in there and not know what you're doing.

Thank you.

so I was thrilled to death.

Here was this little man, and he opened his mouth and opened this little voice.

This is the song which is one of my favorite.

I love to sing it.

So I just devoted the rest of my life to teaching and singing and doing God's work when I can.

Helping people I love to help people makes him feel young and brings back the good memories of way things used to be.

You can go wrong.

Makes me feel good.

It's hell to get older.

When I sing certain songs, I keep people out there crying because that was the song they heard when you were younger.

That field of corn that he teared up.

I and I know that he really enjoyed the connection.

When it come up and tell me how much you like it, that makes me feel real good.

I feel like I've done my job with all those songs this year.

How do you like the concert?

I loved it.

Where do you like best about it?

You.

Me?

Hey, you like me?

Well, I'm a good person.

Like, there ain't no love at all with all those, I might as well use my talent to help other people make them feel good.

And if I do that, that's what my ambition is.

Make people feel good.

Oh, my, this place has really changed since I was here Years ago, probably 40 or 50 years ago, that I sang on the stage.

This is just amazing what they've done with this building.

The stage is about the same, but it really it's a wonderful place.

It has been nearly half a century since Mike Crowley set foot on stage at the Civic Center in Oklahoma City.

There's kind of no words to express.

Express it, just a wonderful feeling.

Even though he only performed here a handful of times, this brief visit brought back a flood of memories.

The audience was really terrific, and when I sang here, of course I did several operatic arias that sang with men large male, gay, great, held.

Often it was singing.

We had the Oklahoma City Symphony.

It makes me wish I was 50 years younger again, so I could do all the things over again.

It's really a wonderful feeling to be back here.

[singing] and for old times sake, Mike took center stage one more time.

[singing] Most of the great opportunities that gone now, and very few of them still left and are still singing.

He wasn't ready for me to go yet.

I'm 83 now and I'm still going strong and hope I still go strong for a while.

[singing] [singing] and a fish.

They're go How about that they get proof that I'm a fisherman and I count my singing come from God.

I mean, he put me here on earth, and he must have had a reason for me to be here.

And I kept singing and fishing.

Is one of them.

Got to look where to find them, But I know where they’re at So that’s why, go straight to where they’re at.

Got quite an opera voice on you there.

Thank you.

Quite a bucket of fish too.

Yeah Very nice.

I was catching the fish.

Okay.

I've been very successful fishing, very successful singing, and I'm going to continue as long as I can.

That's my goal in life to make people happy.

I've got a beautiful feeling.

Everything going my way.

If I can make me happy when singing I’ll sing all the time.