Northeast Michigan Oral History and Historic Photograph Archive

Lois Centala on her father, musician Bill Jerome

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Transcription: CC. We are now at the Alpena County Library, working on the Oral History Program, I'm Carole Cadarette, and I'm here with Kirstine Furtaw, and we have with us today Lois Jerome Centala, LC. That's right. CC. Who's going to talk about her own father, who had his own band here in the Alpena area. Lois, thank you for coming to talk about your Dad. LC. Well, I appreciate it - I've been very proud of my father all my life, and, and the music of the 30s and 40s - the Big Bands, have always been something that I've really enjoyed and I still love that music, but I was very inquisitive as we were - as I was growing up, and I would ask my Dad all kinda things, so I got very close to him, but, as I said, his story is kinda unique to start with. Um, he was born in Syracuse, New York, and he was a self-taught trumpet player. He just learned to play trumpet by himself, and he always played what they call a 'sweet horn', and his big pride, he was telling me, and Carole - you probably understand this, I'm not a musician - I don't, but he could hit C above high C. And he always told me that, especially on the song "Stardust", he would climb to hit that, you know. And as I say, I'm not a musician, but it's funny, now, when I go to concerts, and I hear the, the brass section, and I hear a trumpet player, I can pick that out, that they're climbing. You know. I don't know, but it's just being I was so close to my Dad, I guess. But anyway, um, when he was in New York, (cough) - excuse me - he belonged to a musician's union. And that was the era when the Big Bands toured and especially in New York, and they would just bring their core musicians with them, and um, they would pick up, if they needed a couple trumpets or a couple of saxes, at the union. And so he got, since he was such a good trumpet player, he got jobs right and left with the union. And um, I can remember, I wrote down here some of the big bands that he played with, and I remember um, Glenn Miller, Artie Shaw, Benny Berrigan, Tommy Dorsey, Freddie Martin, Big Spiderback, just to name a few, and I think with him playing with these, he said this is where he picked up a lot of his um, I don't wanna say talent but what would it be? The knowhow, you know, how to, how to really pro- progress so well, you know. CC. I think the actual jargon is "chops". LC. Oh, yeah, he had great chops, the, yeah. But he CC. They learn - no, they learn how to, the technique LC. With technique, playing with these musicians, so . . . that helped him tremendously. In 1931, um, at uh, Fireside Inn at Grand Lake, um, they used to bring in bands for the summer season - it was a big thing, I guess, they had people staying there, and, you know, the richer people and this sort of thing, and in 1931 there was a group called "The Seven New Yorkers", and they came to play the summer, and he, of course, was one of them. And uh, my mother, who was 18 years old at that time, um, they would go out there to listen to musicians, and of course, he was a good-looking little Italian, you know, so she and her girlfriends were - they call 'em groupies now, but I suppose at that time that's what they kinda were. And, uh, her girlfriend's parents owned a grocery store, so uh, they used to bring food out to those guys, so they went on picnics all the time and they got to know the guys very well, and so they took care of the starving musicians more or less and um, so, to make a long story short, they came there in, I think it was May, and they left in September. And of The Seven New Yorkers, six went back. My father stayed. He and my mother ran away and got married - they ran away to Harrisville (laughs) they eloped and got married. CC. What year was that, Lois? LC. That would've been . . . thirty . . . one. 1931. And um, so, they came back, and, and my Dad was 24 years old - he knew nothing but music. So he got a job playing with Sid Pugh's band at that point, and um, so, when I was three - I was born the next year - I was born in August '32 and um, I was 3 months old, and I mean, he just couldn't handle it. You know, he was a stranger here, nobody, you know, didn't have friends, this and that, so they went back to New York and stayed with his parents. And uh, my mother again, 18 years old, she was frantic - especially when his sister said, "Oh, the lovely bébé, oh, we gotta pierce her ears 'cause little Italian bébés need their ears pierced", you know, and my mother panicked, so she wrote to Sid Pugh, and she said, "can you, will you give Bill a job if we come back home?" And at that time my father didn't even know she'd written a letter a year later, so, Sid said "sure, come on back", so that's how he came back to Alpena then. And uh, so that would've been in, uh, '32. And it's funny, as I say, he was a cute Italian now, but I think for a long time, and this is what we were talking about a little while ago, I think he was the only Italian in Alpena until Tony Monino came here, and Tony came here I think like, in the late '60s, '70s. CC. Oh, yeah. LC. Yeah, so, it wasn't a very traditional, all-around town, you know, and um, so that went well for them, and he played then with uh - not only Sid, but with Dolly Gray's band and all this sort of thing. And then - 'scuse me - he got a steady job at the Owl Caflé - Owl Ca - Owl Café, and he formed his own band. And he played, um, 6 - he didn't play Sundays, might not have played Mondays but he - CC. Five nights a week. LC. Every other night, at least five nights a week. You know, and I think back now, I mean, how could he afford - I mean, I don't know what kinda money he was making, but, I mean, that was his whole life, and he didn't have any other kind of job. But um, I know the one thing that he - he brought in musicians from other places, too. I don't know if it was booking agents or what he did, but I do remember, 'cause I was just a little girl at the time and he used to audition singers (inaudible), and I remember the pictures, he took all these girls and they were all trying to make it, too. Especially this one, Audrey Leraine, I've got a picture of her - ah, she was just beautiful. And so he brought her here, or she came here, and she sang with him for quite a while. And, uh, he also had men from, well, Stubby Martin, who played with him for years came from, uh, Benton Harbor, and he made his home here. And again, I - I go back to it, how could they afford that? That's all they did, you know - the income - and, and he started to have a family (clears throat) excuse me, girls, I'm sorry! But, um, it was, it was just always interesting, and I told you about Marion Hutton and, and the other ones that would come after their dance jobs and play with him. So, um, let's see . . . CC. Did your Dad - did your Dad span - did - was it the Bill Jerome Band or was it -? LC. Yeah, mm hm. CC. Ok. LC. It was - it was his own band. He formed his own band. KF. And that was the name of it? Bill Jerome LC. Bill Jerome and his band, yeah. KF. Ok. LC. Yeah. CC. And how many total was in the band, Lois? LC. Uh, five, I think. Five. And, and they changed off. You know, I, I remember, 'cause he was friends with - that was the only friends he had, too, was the, the guys in the band, the ones that stayed here, and then some of the guys from Alpena played with him, too, at the time, like Howard Pake (sp?) played drums for a while with him at the Owl and um, and um, and then later years Joe Emerson played with him, and you know, but as he started out, it was pretty much the same group for a quite a while. And uh, it wasn't until my little sister was born in the 40s that he needed more income - I'm sure that was it - and so he started getting other jobs, and, and uh, but he never laid that horn down, he still played just about every night at the, uh - and it was, it was hard for us kids at home because he played 'till 2:00 in the morning, and so he slept all day CC. Mm hm. LC. and then my mother was at us all day, "be quiet, you can't disturb Dad", you know, so it was kind of, um, interesting. But, um, through there then we - I can always remember him saying that um, he was going to lay down, that he was gonna, he was always gonna retire, he was always gonna retire. "For the first time one of my kids comes into a dance that I'm playing, that's it, I'm laying it down." Well, I went all through high school, I went all through an engagement, and all through my marriage (laugh) and he, he didn't retire until . . . I think he was uh, 63 years old, he actually laid down the horn, that's when he was playing with the Harmonerek - Harmoneers, and when they broke up, then he, he quit. But, uh, it was, the music was his life, he loved his music and, and uh, he was very good at it, and he um, was also active in the community with the music, too - he joined City Band, he was part of, intricate member of the City Band, I've got a picture of him in City Band uniform, and um, he would play all the shows - the minstrel - they used to have a lot of minstrel shows back in that time and he played all the minstrel shows. He got the musicians for the - it wasn't anybody's particular band, Dolly Gray's band or anything like that, Bill would get Dolly Gray and, you know, Austin Deadman and get the guys to, to form a band for the particular show. But he - he lived his music, I mean it was just something sweet that he really, really enjoyed and, and um, as I say, even after he got a full time job at the, uh - he worked for the Road Commission, and uh, he was parts manager there, but he still played every weekend. He still played every weekend. And, um, the kind of funny part of it there, at the Road Commission, Sid Pugh was the uh, office manager of the Road Commission, and I got a job working at the Road Commission. So, I was workin' for Sid Pugh, too, who my Dad worked for in '31, you know? But it was kinda interesting, and I can remember one - I used to ride back and forth with my Dad and I told you I love the, the music of the 40s and all that music, and uh, one time - that's where I heard all these stories from him, he would talk about things, and one time the radio was playing Deep Purple, and I start singing it, "When the deep purple falls" . . . and he turned to me, he said, "How the Hell do you know that song?" And I said, "Because, I love that song!" You know, so you know, we really got into in-depth conversations, and he didn't realize that I was really into everything that he did, so that's when he really told me a lot of different, different things that uh, it, it was just wonderful having him for a father and, and uh, it was really good. KF. Going back to his beginnings as a musician - you said he was self-taught? LC. Mm hm. KF. Um, did he have anybody in his - anybody else in his family that you know of that played? LC. Uh, his - his younger brother started playing a trumpet, too, after my dad KF. After he did? LC. Yeah. But I don't think anybody else - he didn't come from a musical family. KF. Ok. LC. You know, so. KF. Did he, um, so you - did he ever talk about how he got into playing music to begin with? LC. No, not really, just that he liked music and uh, I can't you know, I'm 84 years old, too, I can't . . . (laughter) But I, you know, I probably would remember how he said why he picked the trumpet, but I, I don't remember. All I remember is him telling that he - he got his best education on technique and stuff by playing with these professional musicians when he belonged to - and that went on for, I mean he was 24 when he came here in '31, so this happened - he, he probably started when he was in his teens, and so when they were in the 20s, late 20s, early 30s when they were touring, you know, and uh . . . CC. Well, I'm sitting over here doing the math, and I'm not real good at it, but are you telling me your Dad laid the - his . . . the music down when he was 63; you talking about the 60s and the 70s, somewhere in there? I mean, the year that he, that he quit, that he just didn't play anymore? (14:50) LC. Well, when the Harmoneers at the, 'cause the Harmoneers were playing at the, he was member of the Harmoneers, they played at Twin Acres every weekend,
Creators: Furtaw, Kirstine & Cadarette, Carole, Interviewer; Centala, Lois
, Interviewee
Media Type: Audio; Image; Text
Item Type: Interviews
Publisher: Alpena George N. Fletcher Public Library
Place of Publication: Alpena George N. Fletcher Public Library
Playing Time: 00:44:51
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Contact: Alpena County George N. Fletcher Public Library
Email:specialcollections@alpenalibrary.org
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Lois Centala on her father, musician Bill Jerome

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