| Chapter 6: | The Clarinet |
of the twenty-two schools represented were parochial schools. I had practiced for weeks on my clarinet. With Santo Cutrone, who was in 9B1, we played “Dance with a Dolly” to a packed house. Directed by Fannie Wolff, the James Otis Junior High School musicians featured our clarinet duet, a saxophone duet, and trumpet and accordion solos. Rudolph Lucchese of 9B2 finished our part of the program with a drum solo. It was my finest hour as a clarinetist.
Top musicians came to Benjamin Franklin High to entertain us. Many came from Harlem. The entertainer I remember best for her artistry was Hazel Dorothy Scott. In December 1940 she had performed Liszt’s “Second Hungarian Rhapsody” at Carnegie Hall. During the performance she began to turn it into a jazz number and the audience enjoyed it. She did this again at her performance at Franklin High. I had never heard anything like it. She was a beautiful woman and some of my buddies commented on her looks after her performance. Why she came to a school like Franklin High is a mystery to me. Perhaps she valued the integrated racial conditions encouraged by Dr. Leonard Covello, our principal.
A memorable high point of my musical career came one Friday afternoon when the James Otis Junior High School Band played to a packed auditorium. The audience had come to hear the trumpet playing of the legendary Red DiStefano, a graduate of James Otis and Benjamin Franklin High. Miss Fannie Wolff had drilled us for two weeks for our participation in this program. We began the show with numbers made famous by Artie Shaw, “Begin the Beguine” and “Moonglow.” Mr. Alfred Burger, our choral director