ON

SECOND

THOUGHT

Joseph A. Lanese1915-2009

Editor: Barbara LaneseAssoc. Editor: Carol Lanese

November, 2009

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INTRODUCTION

After our Dad completed his first memoir, From Little Italy to Shangri La in 34,310 Days, he began recalling other incidents and experiences that he neglected to include. We encouraged him to commit them in writing as a sequel. He did, and this is: On Second Thought. He actually finished writing this in about 3-4 months and was finished by the end of 2008. As you know, he passed away in March, 2009, but we hadn’t gotten around to editing and printing it until now. We know he would want all of you to have this installment. Please enjoy it and laugh along with Joe Green!

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DEDICATION

T H E R E S A L A N E S E O’ B R I E N

This sequel is dedicated to his favorite niece, Theresa Lanese O’Brien. Theresa is a dedicated and loving wife to her husband, Bill, and mother to their four children…Jim, Joy, Mike, and John. And we will never forget, Kim. She also dotes over many grandchildren and nieces and nephews.

Theresa inherited her musical talent and developed it with much practice and perseverance. She not only played piano, but also sang and picked up the guitar. Theresa is a very devout Catholic and dedicates much of her time and energy to her faith. She and Joe shared many, many cups of coffee and cookies together, as well as many laughs and tears.

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ON SECOND THOUGHT

NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY

I was a good student at Northwestern; I was a happy student. I had a scholarship which covered my tuition; had a job waiting tables at the North Shore Hotel where I got all my meals. I got on the good side of Cecelia Hoogoopean, the little Greek secretary who gave me weekly tickets to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra Concerts since the School of Music received a good batch. Aside from this I had won over dear Mrs. Bishop who had season tickets to the Chicago Orchestra concerts. Mrs. Bishop was a sweet widow who had tickets to the concerts too, so between the School of Music and Mrs. Bishop I got to hear the orchestra every week. I was a good, reliable student who won the hearts of several of the faculty. They often marveled at the talent I seemed to have in relation to instrumental music, arranging, and the excellent background in orchestral performance. I played the violin, of course, but I was also able to play the viola, and when violas are in demand, it’s the task of the conductor to try to urge the violinists to switch.

I had been very happy with my arrangement, as were the faculty members. Yes, I had to learn the basics of all the instruments, but my records show that my “applied” was violin. Everybody had to have an “applied,” be it instrumental, vocal, piano, or composition. I wish they had offered an “applied” in conducting. I would have jumped on it! Anyway, my “applied” was violin. But in the orchestra I played viola, which is always the weakest section of the orchestra. I was principal of the section. To appease some of the other violists who had come from the violin section, I

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considered returning to the violin section. At the next rehearsal I looked at all the violinists, trying to see where I would be sitting if I went back to the violin section: looked to me like maybe on the 5th stand. But conductor George Dasch came up to me and told me he wanted me as principal of the 2nd violins. Not bad! And certainly better than sitting on the 5th stand.

The orchestra was preparing to rehearse the final concert of the season. As it has been for years where the outstanding instrumentalists, pianists and vocalists are featured on this glamorous occasion. The members of the string faculty convened and decided I should be the violin soloist on this occasion. I talked at length with Mr. Sheasby and I told him I was NOT a stand-up soloist. If I wanted to be a soloist I would have gone to Curtis in Philadelphia, or Eastman in Rochester, Julliard was not open yet. Anyway I did have the Mendelssohn violin concerto and the Winieawsky violin concerto under my fingers. I had worked so diligently on those 2 numbers hoping to NEVER being asked to play it in public. I guess the string faculty was miffed to say the least. I continued my course, attending for 4 summers, where I was studying violin with George Dasch, former member of the Chicago Symphony and work on the Bruch violin concerto and he had asked me to perform that concerto with the summer orchestra and again I had to convince Mr. Dasch I WAS NO Heifetz. An off shoot of this decision kind of drifted toward the naming of members to the highly respected PI KAPPA LAMBDA honorary professional fraternity. And even more so. I learned long ago that PI KAPPA LAMBDA was founded in 1929 at Northwestern University by Dean Peter Kappa Lambda, the Greek letters signifying his name. They turned me down for refusing to perform at that concert. I was not honored to membership in the highly esteemed professional fraternity.

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While at Northwestern I ran into a man who gave me insight to arranging for band. Paul Yoder spent his entire life arranging music for bands. I took the course and learned the secrets of good band arrangements. His first message to the class was, “You will probably not have a complete instrumentation in your band, so you will learn how to score ‘tailor-made-bands‘.” That same summer Johnny Blanock, my closest friend who would honor me by being my best man at our wedding, asked a favor of me which I never regretted. He had attended Hamtramck High School in Detroit but needed an arrangement of his high school fight song. The song, “Cameo,” was composed by their band director, and over the years, band parts were lost. The only trace of that music was an old 45 rpm disc and it was rather scratchy, barely audible, but I busied myself that summer and “Cameo” was heard again at Hamtramck football games.

The last concert of the Northwestern University Orchestra in 1934 featured several outstanding performers, among them was a mature coloratura soprano who was scheduled to sing the famous “ARIA “Una Voce Poco Fa” from Rossini’s Barber of Seville. Everything went well at the rehearsal until she reached the cadenza. Mr. Dasch stopped the orchestra and asked the soloist, “What happened to the original cadenza?” “Oh” she calmly replied, “my voice teacher changed it to improve the aria.” “Well,” said Mr. Dasch, “you go right back and tell your voice teacher you’ll sing it as Rossini wrote it or you’ll not sing it at all!” Bravo!

WHITING, INDIANA

The music groups were practicing and rehearsing feverishly

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for the state championship. The director was offering last minute advice to the students to take their instruments home, clean them, and be sure to shine the brass horns with a good brass polish and oil all key mechanisms. Good advice. On my way to the washroom I met little Billy running water down the clarinet starting at the bell. HE HAD TO HAVE EVERY PAD REPLACED AND ADJUSTED.

CLEVELAND

Here’s a problem marching band directors meet. Glenville was not interested in marching band as an art form, possibly because the Jewish people were more attuned to orchestra literature with strings and cellos and string basses. But we did have a marching at band at Glenville.

The group within the band that garners the most attention is not the drummers nor trombones, but the corps of girls who don’t play a horn and add not an iota of musical performance. They are the majorettes who add nothing to the musical performance on the field. They are the majorettes who are always asking for more exposure, meaning more time to dance to the music. At Glenville we had 1 majorette who also acted as the drum major. Some day I’ll reveal to you how much the drum major adds to the musical performance on the field. On a beautiful day, Glenville was scheduled to play East High at Patrick Henry Field at 3 P. M. The band had already assembled at the east end of the field and our majorette hadn’t shown up yet. Just then this fiery little whipper-snapper shows up, not in a Glenville uniform but in a mixture of voodoo oriental dancer and Hawaiian hula dancer. “SIS,” I said, “you can’t march in that outfit. It’s scandalous” “But Mr. Lanese, I march in this uniform all the time with the Brothers of Sal Goldman

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Society.” “Sis,” I told her. “This is NOT the Jewish Society. Go back home and change into a Glenville uniform or you won’t march at all!” She changed and she marched.

In the mid forties when I was teaching at Patrick Henry Junior High School, I was also teaching privately at the Liederbach Music Studios in Cleveland Heights as instructor in violin. Among the pupils wanting to learn to play the violin was a little 5th grader, about 9 years old. He had no idea where the fingers should be placed on the fingerboard, or to be more blunt, his intonation was horrendous. I asked him to put the violin down and sing, sing to me the tune he was trying to play, namely, Old Black Joe. He looked up at me, stunned at the fact I wanted him to sing the melody and proclaimed right there, “I didn’t come here for singing lessons!” There went another Heifetz!

Oh, and how we learn how to play the game. Schools all closed on June 18. Going to the parking lot I met a dozen or so young students waiting to wish me a happy summer. They presented me a small package neatly wrapped with white paper and a gold ribbon tied to it on top. My first gift from students, a truly remarkable Meerschaum pipe and a pound of imported pipe tobacco. I was aware of the board’s feelings about receiving gifts or monies as gifts from pupils or parents. So, examining my conscience I returned my valued Meerschaum pipe to the young students. One of them asked me where I park my Volkswagen. I told them they were standing on the exact spot. Wouldn’t you know it, the very next day that same package appeared on the passenger side of my trusted Volkswagen. I don’t know where it came from, honest!

Benny Bailey

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I first heard about Benny Bailey from my son, Bob, who had met and played along side him on several occasions and had nothing but high praise for that musician. In Bob’s own words “Benny is the greatest jazz trumpeter in Europe today!” He was born in Cleveland and attended East Tech High School. He lives in Amsterdam but travels all over Europe playing with some of the finest array of jazz musicians of Europe, always being introduced as the featured artist. I was hoping I’d get to meet him some day. Lucky me, I didn’t have to wait too long.

On a beautiful Sunday morning I was browsing through the Cleveland Plain Dealer and my eye was attracted to a reception that afternoon at the East Cleveland Public Library, Euclid and Eddy Road. The reception was for Benny Bailey, formerly from Cleveland, now residing in Europe. The reception was at 4 o’clock and everyone was invited. WOW, my big chance to meet Benny Bailey. I quickly picked up a couple recent photos of Bob and took off for the East Cleveland Public Library. Sure enough, a large crowd had already gathered at the library. Looking around to see if I might find a familiar face among the throng of black people, I was disappointed. Really, I was the only white person in that crowd, who, by this time were all gathered around the guest, grasping and exchanging greetings. I slowly and quietly reached the honoree and said, “Benny, I bring you greetings from Hamburg, Germany.” Suddenly the smile on his face disappeared and he solemnly asked, “Are you da PO-lice?” I picked a photo of Bob and gave it to him. “Hey, dat’s Bob Lanese.” So we chatted awhile and he had nothing but the finest compliments about Bob, his playing and his person. And I am so glad I met him!

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In 1943 we moved to Cleveland to begin my involvement with the Cleveland Schools. During my first years I ran into Vince Patti, clarinet and saxophone artist who made quite a reputation with the organization of the Vince Patti Band. While attending Shaw High School in East Cleveland he befriended a very talented musician, Hal Lynn, and the two got together and developed an outstanding jazz band earning a statewide reputation.

At this time Vince Patti asked me to join the Hermit Club Orchestra as a violist. The purpose of the orchestra was to offer members an opportunity to play music of a high caliber under a professional conductor. Members were bank presidents and CEO’s of the leading firms and businesses in northern Ohio. The orchestra rehearsed every Monday night from 7:30 to 10:00. The rehearsals began after the sumptuous dinners. Steaks were offered, as well as prime rib, filet mignon, and other cuts of meat. The orchestra presented 2 or 3 concerts a year, usually in their ritzy place at East 12TH and Euclid. Christmas was an elegant black tie dinner with egg nog. There have been travels to similar club houses in northern Ohio and the Hermit Club visited them regularly.

I had been playing viola or string bass as needed. I also played tympani when the regular tympanist didn’t show up. Vince Patti noticed that I was playing string bass and he suggested I join the Musician’s Union and I could pick up some extra money. I did, and immediately signed on with the Patti/Hal Lynn Agency. Through all those years I was able to pick up some added money. Not enough to live on but extra change for gas, cigars, and pipe tobacco. Yes I smoked a pipe all those years, but had to stop when my dentist showed me the weight of the pipe in my mouth was damaging my teeth. Never touched it after that.

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WEST TECH

On double reed instruments I like to start with the reed placement, blowing long tones, shaving the reed, the 3rd lesson is assembling the oboe, the first 2 lessons are no problem. After the 2nd lesson she came to school with her oboe, said it wouldn’t play for her. Looked at it, nothing out of line, but was limited to several open notes, keys not functioning properly. I TOLD HER THIS WAS A VERY COMPLICATED AND EXPENSIVE INSTRUMENT. She admitted she was showing it to her father and he told his daughter that all the keys were loose so he tightened each one. I explained to her that EVERY KEY had its own adjustable screw. So I sent her to a woodwind expert and had the whole instrument adjusted. Parents do more harm than good.

West Tech High School band students are wont to leave their note books and text books around the band room. I made a practice of checking around the band room for books, purses, glasses, notebooks, lunches, and other paraphernalia, and hid them in my personal closet. The following day the “absent-minded” students would ask me about their losses, Well, I simply had opened a pawn shop and they could retrieve their lost items for a dime. It worked wonders and the list of absent-minded students got smaller each day.

Another stroke of luck I ran into was when the girls came to school with heavy lipstick and other cosmetics. I now was preaching to the girls, mainly clarinet players, pointing out that lipstick on the reed makes it difficult to play with a good, clean sound. I was getting nowhere with them so I

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consulted my cerebrum again for a solution. BINGO! I went down to the nurse’s office and procured 12 tongue blades, all free of course. At the end of the school day I would check the equipment room, and by this time I could identify each girl’s clarinet case. Now the dirty work steps in. I would open the case. If the reed was coated with lipstick, the player received a new “reed” for her old one. I’ll tell you, we had a lot of laughs, but the girls all learned their lesson. Like “some way of skinning a cat,” no?

There was always a pitch problem with students, some due to the imperfection of the measurements of the instrument. Later I learned to use correct terminology when dealing with young people. During a band rehearsal I detected faulty intonation in the trumpet section. I asked the entire section to check pitch; no help. Then I noticed a wide discrepancy on the first stand where 2 girls shared a stand. I asked Margie to play the note and check it with the tuning fork: right on the nose, perfect.Next, I asked Margie’s partner to play the same note. You’ll be interested to know that Margie’s stand partner was a quart shy in the aural sense, although she was indeed well endowed! And she certainly realized it so why shouldn’t she wear that snug fitting white sweater? I called on DOROTHY to play that same note. Now listen to the tuning bar, “Dorothy, do they sound the same? Can you sing it?” Dorothy was becoming more and more confused, so in a minute of desperation she blew the fatal note that was eating away at her insides. Of course everyone in that row felt for her and wanted to offer her inspiration, but her hearing was not her best POINT. Her note was undoubtedly on the low side. I wanted to relieve her of the exasperation. So in a lower and controlled voice I spoke quietly, “Dorothy, you’re flat!” The whole band roared in unison and was the laugh of the year for the high school band.

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As I was checking in one morning at the front desk in West Tech High School, I accidentally ran into Mr. Tuck, the venerable Principal of the school who was known for his very strict discipline for the entire student body of 4000 students, and the faculty, too. Instead of the usual morning greeting, I asked Mr. Tuck kiddingly if I may run up to the barber shop and get a haircut that morning. “Not on school time do you get a haircut!” “But Mr. Tuck, my hair GROWS on school time.“ “No haircut on school time.” End of conversation.

When word of my promotion to supervisor got out, I could visualize the boys and girls of the band and orchestra planning some kind of surprise for my promotion. I had already moved into the downtown offices of the Board of Education and had no idea of what was going on in Room 412. On Thursday of that week I received a formal invitation to attend that Friday’s game, and slyly, they called my wife to ask her to be sure to come to that game, for it was a surprise. So on that Friday night we showed up at the WT Stadium, the sousaphones sporting JAL, my initials, over the bells, and the band presented an entire halftime show, all written and arranged by members of the band. Later I learned that they had contacted the Plain Dealer. Not wanting to spoil the surprise, they withheld the entire story (with pictures) until Saturday of that week. Following the game we joined the members of the band at the Kiwanis Hall for refreshments and I was presented a beautiful Sony reel-to- reel tape recorder. What a memorable night that was!

ADMINISTRATORS

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There are good administrators, and then there are others.

While I was the Directing Supervisor of Music in Cleveland, every senior high school, junior high school, and elementary school had an instrumental and a vocal teacher. All principals were asked to cut personnel. I ran into one of those men whose IQ equaled their golf score. He cut the vocal teacher and assigned the vocal classes to the instrumentalist. I sought out the principal next morning, trying to tell him that instrumental teachers are not qualified to teach voices. He could do more harm to those young voices, especially at those tender ages. He said “All I have is a license that says he is qualified to teach music.” I asked him if he would he go to a cardiologist if his teeth needed attention, or would he go to a cardiologist? They’re both doctors. He couldn’t see it and I lost a good teacher who went to night school to earn a license in personnel work.

FAVORITE HUMOROUS MUSICAL MOMENTS

Music Lover?????

A group of us were on our way to a symphony concert, and one of the passengers on the bus asked, “What’s on the concert tonight?”I politely answered, “Pictures at an Exhibition.”The music lover was dumbfounded “I thought we were going to a symphony concert, not the art museum?”

Mahler

This was the big night at the symphony concert. On the program was a single composition, Gustav Mahler’s

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monumental Symphony No. 2, the “Resurrection Symphony,” featuring two vocal soloists, large choir, and a massive orchestra. There are 6 movements in the symphony but only at the very end of the last movement does the choir join the orchestra in a blaze of glory and jubilation! Truly, a most exciting evening! The audience rose as the soloists, the chorus and the orchestra received kudos, a standing ovation, and “bravos” being heard throughout the hall. A young couple seated next to me were enjoying the program, and without wasting one minute, the young man leaned toward his lady friend and spoke, “I wished he had made the chorus sing more.”

Pastoral Symphony

A group of music lovers were getting themselves comfortable that Sunday afternoon seated before the stereo in our living room, awaiting the broadcast of the New York Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra. The opening number was Beethoven’s Sixth Symphony, known as the “Pastoral” Symphony. The host delivered a thorough and detailed account of the symphony, calling attention to Beethoven’s love of nature, especially the second movement, where he describes the burbling brook wending its way down through the trees and emptying into the ocean. As a courtesy to latecomers, the orchestra always waits a few moments to allow guests to find their seats. During the brief intermission, the strings began to tune, the flutes and oboes were warming up on scales, the clarinets played arpeggios up and down. The entire range of the instruments caused a cacophony of sound. At this point one of our guests, apparently not a music lover, spoke in a rather overly confident voice, “Isn’t that beautiful? I can just see the burbling brook flowing down towards the ocean!” YAHOO!

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Budding Cellist

Charlie always aspired to become a cellist. One day he noticed in the want ads of the local paper a “cello for sale, plays good, excellent condition, $100.” This was his lucky day; he went right out and purchased this cello. He brought it home, sat on a chair, applied rosin to the bow and began moving the bow back and forth across the G string, “whang,” “whang,” “whang” all day long. His wife came home after a wearisome day at the mall, only to find him in the kitchen, sitting on a chair bowing and bowing across the G string, “whang,” “whang,” “whang.”

She listened for a very brief moment, then asked Charlie, “I saw a cello player on television and he had his left hand on the long piece moving his fingers up and down. “How come you’re playing that whang, whang, whang? It‘s getting on my nerves.” He replies, “That shows what you know about the cello. The guy you saw on television is still looking for his note; I already found mine!”

Former Students

Being involved with students all my life I find myself meeting former students from time to time. At WalMart last month I ran into a former pupil I hadn‘t seen in years. Being the gentleman as usual, he duly introduced me to his mother, “Mom, this is my OLD band teacher.” “No, no,” I say, “FORMER not OLD!”

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Vivaldi

At a recent New York Philharmonic concert, the program consisted of The Seasons, Concertos for Violin and Orchestra. Apparently some of the audience were not aware that all 4 concertos had 4 movements each. Cause of applause at the wrong time! The orchestra had barely begun the first movement of the second concerto when applause interrupted the concert, not realizing that it was only the beginning of the second concerto and the concert was not over yet.

Opera on TV

This is a true story. On a popular television show Robert Merrill and Roberta Peters were singing a familiar duet from Verdi’s Traviata. He was resplendent in his elegant Alfredo’s outfit and she in a beautiful white ball gown with many layers of petticoats. As Merrill began his aria looking amorously into Roberta’s eyes, she joined him in the passionate duet. I immediately sensed something askew ,as she had bluntly altered the lyrics of that aria as she sang “guarda la mano in dietra.”(translation: “watch that hand back there.”) It’s so good to know Italian sometimes.

A LOOK INTO THE ITALIAN FAMILY

Holidays and Holy Days were celebrated in the same fashion as they were in Italy, with all members present. Christmas began long before December 24. My father and Uncle John would settle down at the kitchen table discussing meats, fish, assortment of nuts, lettuce, fruit and seasonal sweets, usually imported.

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Luckily for us, my Uncle John had owned and operated a mom and pop neighborhood grocery store for many years and still had contacts with the downtown meat markets and fresh vegetable markets. With shopping list in hand they would start off on this mission, picking out the meats and fish of the season. I can remember the various kinds of fish that graced our table on December 24, that being a meatless day among the Catholics.

Fresh fruits were a big item in our household. During the late months of summer when fruits were ripe, my father and uncle would make a quick trip downtown to the markets and usually come home with baskets of apples, cherries, pears, pineapple, watermelons, cantaloupe, and honeydews. And figs, oh how my father liked the figs. And on one of these brief trips to the downtown market, they returned empty handed. My mother asked the men, “What did you buy today?” My father answered, “Pears.” My mother says, “Pears ,I don’t see any pears.” Father explains, “We ate them!” (This is really funny in Italian.)

As I recall, we celebrated Thanksgiving Day, then Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, and the following day, December 26, an important day in the Catholic church. It was really another day to be together again and we sure did have leftovers, enough for another feast. The Christmas season comes to a festive close on January 5 or 6, I’m not sure. In Italy, it’s known as the Feast of the Epiphany. Aren’t you glad to know that?

I was high school age, still in Cleveland, not ready for college yet, when we received an invitation to a Sunday dinner at the home of friends of ours in the Collinwood area. We graciously accepted, so on the appointed Sunday, my

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father, mother, and I drove to their spacious home on Whitcomb Road, arriving promptly at 2 o'clock. After exchanging greetings and some small talk, we were ushered into the expansive dining room, tastefully arranged for 7 people. My attention was focused on the table, sporting platters of spaghetti, meat balls, Italian sausage, leafy salads with freshly folded dinner napkins on the table. Now I must tell you, these people, hosts, were "dyed in the wool" Catholics and I do have some misgiving about people who are so intensely devoted to their religion and try to portend they are the only true worshipers on this earth. I always look where I'm going to put my next foot. The hostess came into the dining room and asked everybody to stand while she recited the offertory. She thanked God, St. Francis, St. Joseph, St. Stephen, St. John, St. Philip, St. Andrew, St. Jerome, on and on and on and on she went. I was beginning to feel the weight on my left leg. My mother was catching her breath between those saints. My father was shifting his weight from one leg to the other. Now placing his right hand cupped over his mouth to give me a message; he leaned towards me and whispered into my ear using the familiar dialect “Ma, finiscela prima si refrescano I maccheroni “ (All right already, finish it before the spaghetti gets cold.)

THE ITALIAN CUISINE

You know that the Italians celebrate every holiday and holy day with a feast, including every member, and sometimes even a dog. Food is the piece d’ resistance. French I don’t know. So we’d gather together on Thanksgiving Day, meeting at our house, then my brother’s, and then my parents’ place.

In our family, growing up in Little Italy, we had a pasta dish

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every night. Some people don’t get it, They seem to think we had SPAGHETTI every night. Wrong. Pasta comes in different lengths, different shapes, ruffled, grooved. You’ve heard of tortellini, rigatoni, ziti, linguini, fettuccini, lasagna, gnocchi, elbows, shells, mostaccioli, farfalle, pipette. All these forms of pasta could be found on the shelves of any modern grocery chain. My mother always found different ways to serve the pasta, sometimes with chicken, pork, or veal, and always good with fish. And the worst dinner that I hated with a passion was pasta with lentils. UGH! It probably was good, but I didn’t like it.

Gotta come back to the Christmas festivities. It seemed to me the kitchen table was never cleaned off. After dinner we had fresh fruit, then an assortment nuts, and the ever present torrone, Italian chewable candy which made the dentists happy.

Now that we all had been fed and burped, we resorted to the perennial game of Lotto, a game that every one could participate in. An elder was appointed to read the numbers and dispense the small change in the pot. Only hang-up was the lotto numbers were called in ITALIAN. Fine; this made it possible for everyone to play except for the wee ones. Bob, who at that time was 3 or 4, didn’t understand venti-due, quaranta-- sette, tredici, so he sat in my mother’s lap and after every called number he’d look up to her and said, “Do I have it Gramma?” Good old days they were.

THANKSGIVING alla Italiana

Yes, we celebrated all the holidays and holy days with a hint of our native Italy. We would alternate between my house,

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my brother’s, or our parents’ home. It was pasta, pasta, and more pasta. On Sundays and the holy days my mother prepared home-made pasta She’d start early in the morning, before anyone got up, and was sifting flour, adding other ingredients as needed. The meats were already in a large size pot on the kitchen range, heating up to a boiling point, sending familiar, scintillating scents and mouthwatering odors throughout the house. Same menu: salad, pasta with meat balls, Italian sausage and fresh fruit. After one of these man-size dinners my wife and my sister-in-law got their heads together and decided we should prepare a turkey dinner for Thanksgiving, preserving the original meaning of the dinner. So turkey it was at the next Thanksgiving dinner. My father had a long face for a month, wouldn’t speak to me. I asked, “What’s the matter, Pa?” Face drawn, eyes looking downward, he slowly confessed he didn’t like the turkey dinner, no pasta. In his friendly dialect he spoke, “ne vale la festa.” translation, “it’s not worth it with no pasta.” Good, he made his point. The following year we had turkey AND a side dish of SPAGHETTI. Now my father was all smiles again. Or as he would say, BRAVO, BRAVO!

ALL IN THE FAMILY

Here are a couple interesting bits that kinda throw a faint light on the Lanese clan. Carol visited her OB/GYN doctor for her regular annual checkup with the following results: Carol’s in A-one condition and shows the beginning of menopause! Geez, there goes my last chance of reaching grandfatherhood! Maybe Bob could bring into the world another Lanese?! Good luck.

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You know that Barbara and Carol are handling our finances, medical appointments, medications, and everything else in between. Recently Carol found an error in my check book, a discrepancy of 2 cents. “Hell,” I said, “let it go.” Everyone seemed to agree, except Carol. She sat down with the check book, noting all the entries, debits, and credits. Get this! Thirty minutes later we heard Carol screaming and shouting at Barbara. Scanning all the figures Barbara had misread an 8 for a 6, thus explaining Barbara’s miscalculation. Carol readily recognized Barbara’s handwriting and that solved the problem.

Looking back on my life, I have been involved in music every living day, be it school, college, professional, and purely recreational. How did I come into this world of music? My father had a passionate interest in all things musical. He told me he bought an accordion during his younger days and used it to entertain my mother, his wife. He never mentioned the accordion and I did not learn if it was a piano keyboard or a button box, as they’re called here in America. He liked to sing, not necessarily the love songs, and the familiar folk tunes of the soil he loved so much.

As a little boy I was always at his side when he was solving a plumbing or electrical problem. As I watched him working with the various tools, I was more fascinated by the tunes he was singing. They certainly were not folk songs; they were arias from Italian operas and that was the opening of the door for me to appreciate opera, especially Italian opera.

We had a wind-up Victrola with 78 rpm breakable 12” records. My father started one of these record collections, the better ones that had only one side grooved, the other side was blank and black. We had recordings by Caruso, Galli-Curci, Toscanini, and other great ones of the day. With

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this background I was beginning to do something serious for a change.

My mother was not too heavily engaged in music but she could recognize and identify the opera and the aria. She had a beautiful voice and I marveled at her pitch and diction, easy for those of us who speak Italian. And that was the extent of my mother’s interest in music.

I thank the Lord every day for giving me this so-called talent which has provided me with hours and hours of seamless music, be it Mendelssohn, Brahms, or Stravinsky. It has given me the ability to listen to the music of the masters, continuing to add to the list of 20th century composers. This God-given appreciation was passed on to my children who are beginning to learn and appreciate music beyond West Side Story, and Dizzy Gillespie. Somehow my brother was bypassed of this love for music but, his children, Michael and Theresa, were blessed with this natural ability to play and sing. Some of us have it, others don’t. I can remember when Theresa was wrestling with her Chickering grand piano and doing very well. She even wrote a song for Bill, her husband. She made a tape, gave it to Bob, and he, in turn, gave it to a friend, who arranged it for dance band, and we heard that tape the following Christmas. When Theresa tired of the scales and studies on the piano, she purchased a guitar and learned the few basic chords to play for the Sunday mass at Sacred Heart Catholic Church.

When Carol was in the 3rd or 4th grade, I don’t remember which, she came to dinner with a trick question for me. They had talked about personal habits and health care during the 30-minute class period called HYGIENE. She was so anxious to catch me off guard, hoping to stump me. BUT, at the dinner table before Bob, Barbara, and her

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parents, looked at me with a glint in her eye and asked “Daddy, I’ll bet you don’t know what they call the tube that connects the inner ear with the outer ear?” Of course I knew it was the Eustachian tube but I didn’t want her thinking she was pulling a fast one on me, so I spoke with authority, “FALLOPIAN!” “WRONG, Daddy, and you’re in the wrong area. It’s the Eustachian tube.” We all laughed and continued with the dinner. My smart-ass daughter, a typical Harvard graduate!

Going back to earlier days………When Bob was two years old he had mastered the art of walking but hadn’t learned to speak yet. Laura was worried he might be a subject of mental retardation, but he was able to make several sounds which we all accepted as his means of communication. We took the 2- year old Bob to Dr. Hermann, the pediatrician. Doctor asks, “Does Bob utter any distinguishable sounds?” “Yes,” Laura said, “but it’s UNGAH, and he uses it all day long pointing to water or the refrigerator.” “Sure” said Dr Hermann, “don’t you see? He doesn’t have to learn to speak, he GETS what he wants.” Had us buffaloed!

LIFE IN THE SOUTH

At the Wildwood Downs Retirement Community we were introduced to southern cuisine. Melissa, a senior at Ridgeview High School, took our order for the evening dinner. I had no trouble with the menu until I got to the word grits. “Grits!” I asked Melissa “What’s this grits stuff?” And she described the seemingly tasteless concoction and we told her we were not interested in grits. ”What!” she exclaimed, “you don’t want grits?” I shot back, “We never heard of grits. We don’t like the taste, the texture, the color,

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or anything else. We never had any and we don’t intend to eat that tonight or any other time.” She quickly snatched the menu from my hands and walked away mumbling, “Mr. Lanese, I’m going to pray for you!”

WINE AS A CURE ALL

In the Italian home, wine is used at every meal and for any other occasion. You will never see water on the dinner table. As my father would say, “Water is for washing dishes.” If he had a headache, he drank wine; if he had an upset stomach, he drank wine; if he felt tired after a day’s work, he drank wine. It was always wine, wine, wine. I said to him one day, “Pa, why are you making up all these outlandish excuses just to drink wine? Why don’t you just drink it and don’t bother us with your fake ailments.”

END OF STORY!

jg

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