by Ingrid Croce
“Jim, you’ve got the talent to make it like Dylan,” said Joe Salvioulo, Jim’s closest friend, whom everyone called Sal. They’d met at Villanova University when Jim auditioned for a student talent show, and now, a year and a half later, they sat listening to records in Jim’s living room, as they often did. From the first time they met, Sal’s flamboyant wardrobe and unorthodox ways stood out from those of Jim’s other, more conservative college classmates. “Besides, if a Jew can make it singing American folk songs, so can an Italian,” he joked. Jim grinned.
“That would be great, man. I’d love to play Carnegie Hall! Ya know, Dylan played there last month.”
“Yeah, I know. Remember? I saw him here on the same tour, at Town Hall. He was great. He walked on the stage like he owned it. He sang ‘Blowin’ in the Wind,’ ‘Don’t Think Twice,’ and ‘Masters of War.’ The audience was so quiet when he sang it was eerie.”
“God, I’d love to be able to do that,” Jim admitted.
“Practice,” Sal encouraged, smiling at the old joke, though he really meant it, and added: “You can do it!”
Jim looked at his watch.
“Hey, it’s getting late. I better get down to the radio station.”
They headed upstairs to get their coats before heading out into the chilly Philadelphia evening.
Jim’s father approached the side of the staircase and called after them: “Hey, Jim, I want to talk to you—alone.” His index finger was pointed up at his son, his face tense with anger. Sal slowly climbed the rest of the way upstairs himself; Jim hesitated, anticipating his father’s wrath.
“Move it. I mean now!” Jim hurried back down. “I’ve been listening to you boys talk, and I don’t like it one bit,” his father said, closing in on him. “It’s alright to play your music and have a little fun, but you’re never to consider it anything more than a hobby. Don’t ever get it into your head that you can make music a profession. Leave that for a different kind of people.”
He’d heard the lecture before, but Jim was feeling rebellious enough at that moment to taunt his father. It didn’t happen often.
“What do you mean ‘a different kind of people’?” he said with a trace of sarcasm.
“Listen, mister, you know perfectly well what I mean. Your mother and I don’t send you to college so you can grow up and sing songs about drunks and drifters. We won’t stand for it!” Jim bit his lower lip and looked away. “You’re getting involved with the wrong kind of people. You’ll never amount to a thing!” His dad’s voice rose, and his finger jabbed the air. “Music is for gypsies, not for my son. You don’t know what the real world is like.” He took a quick breath. “It’s bad enough you study psychology. What the hell do you think you can do with that? I’m not sending you to college to be a bum, and that’s final!”
“I’m not a bum.”
“Don’t talk back to me!” his father shouted, and slapped Jim’s face sharply with the back of his hand.
Jim recoiled, glanced into his father’s raging eyes, and backed away.
His father, James Alfred, turned and walked into the kitchen. James would never have disrespected his own father. As the eldest son, he had always placed duty to family first, solemnly accepting the role as go-between for his immigrant parents and his American brothers and sisters. The Croces were honorable people who had brought with them the principles of hard work and dedication to family, and James Alfred had worked diligently to overcome the misconceptions and stereotypes of the Italian immigrant.
Jim kept his hand pressed to his cheek to stop the sting and fled up to his room. He gathered his coat, songbooks, and guitar. When he and Sal came back down to leave, his parents ignored them. His father sat reading a magazine in the living room; his mother stood in the kitchen, covering leftover rapini with plastic wrap.
Only Jim’s maternal grandfather, Massimo Babusci, whom everyone called Pa, acknowledged Jim. Pa had lived with them since the death of his wife, Bernice, a year earlier. The old man liked to sit in his favorite overstuffed easy chair and sing along at the top of his lungs to old records on his Victrola, re-creating the great Italian operas. Pa had trouble remembering anything that had happened the day before, but he could clearly describe the piazza of his youth and the puppy that had peed on his leg when he was a boy.
Jim loved his grandfather and affectionately squeezed his shoulder when he passed his chair. “The boy,” Pa murmured and nodded, patting Jim’s hand. He couldn’t remember his grandson’s name.
Jim and Sal stepped outside, and Jim closed the front door behind him. Turning his collar to the cold, he stood momentarily on the doorstep. His grandfather had put on a record. Jim recognized the opening stanzas to a song by Enrico Caruso. As if on cue, Pa began to sing along.
With Sal ahead of him, Jim ran shivering to his ’61 Volkswagen Beetle and jumped in. As they backed out of the driveway, he glanced up and saw his father standing at the living room window, looking out.
“I wonder if he’ll ever understand,” Jim said aloud.
A light carpet of snow covered the Main Line on the way to the Villanova radio station, WWVU. Jim and Sal discussed various conspiracy theories surrounding the assassination of JFK.
“Everyone’s sad around here lately,” Jim said. “My mother hasn’t let a day go by without mourning. My uncles are upset that the mafia is being blamed.”
“The real issue is power,” Sal insisted. “It’s not so much who did it but why they did it.”
Jim dropped Sal off at his apartment and drove on to the campus station. By the time he arrived, he was mentally prepared for his broadcast, a three-hour folk and blues show, including an interview segment that provided Jim the opportunity to meet and talk with a number of the major folk and blues artists who had begun to influence him.
Tonight, Jim was airing a prerecorded talk with Mississippi John Hurt. He’d taped the session earlier in the week. The seventy-year-old black Southern man had generously given him a warm and informative interview, and had brought his guitar.
Jim took his seat alone in the control booth and rolled the tape:
“I heard you played the Newport Folk Festival with Bob Dylan last summer, and that more than 45,000 people showed up to hear you. How did that make you feel?”
“It made me feel real good to be invited to Freebody Park,” Hurt said. “That was like real family. Lots of my friends were there, like John Lee Hooker. But Bob Dylan, he sure done brung those folks in.”
“Do you believe the Festival marked a comeback in your own career?”
“I certainly don’t think it hurt,” he answered, laughing. “Of course, my career has seen more comebacks than a Friday night fish fry. I’ve been around a long time, you know. My first record for Okeh was in 1928.”
The recording continued with Jim asking Hurt if he would play some songs. The musician gladly obliged with “Make Me a Pallet on Your Floor” and “Richland’s Women Blues.”
Jim joined in, strumming his guitar behind Hurt’s syncopated rhythms on “Corrina, Corrina” and “Stackolee.”
Jim then asked him to tell stories about his past.
Sitting in the booth, listening to the recording, Jim thought that Hurt’s emotional, soulful speaking made it seem as if he were still singing. After the interview, Jim had thanked the musician reverently; he knew he had just encountered a legend, a hero of a vanishing period in American history.
Jim closed the program at 10 PM with a final announcement: “Don’t forget to make a date for the Giant Hootenanny and Contest on Saturday, January 25, at Philadelphia Convention Hall. This show will be sponsored in part by Villanova, and I’ll be joining Tommy Picardo and the rest of the Coventry Lads to perform and do the judging.”
He punched in “Irene, Goodnight” by Leadbelly for the last tune of the evening.
Tommy Picardo, a junior and one of his best friends at Villanova, came into the studio, entered the booth quietly, and sat down in a chair, waiting for Jim to shut down. Jim
and Tommy had promised to audition local groups at another radio station that night for the upcoming hootenanny. But by now the storm had worsened, and Jim wasn’t looking forward to plowing through the snow to get to downtown Philadelphia.
The two hustled outside into the cold and got in Jim’s VW. A blizzard slowed the drive down the Main Line. Drifts piled up on the road as the snow swirled in the headlights. Jim eased his way through the storm.
When they arrived at the radio station, Jim entered the parking lot and noticed a car angled awkwardly in a snowdrift, its wheels spinning madly in the snow. A young woman jumped out of the car and pushed against the hood with all of her strength.
Jim caught a glimpse of the girl’s shiny, long dark hair and bright eyes, illuminated in the car’s headlights. Inside the car, five young men in military uniforms sat cheering her on. Jim slowed down to watch. The teenager gave him an embarrassed smile and waved. He hit the brakes to get a good look at the girl, just as the car full of uniformed boys was freed from the snowdrift. Jim smiled and waved back at her and drove on into the lot to find a place to park.
Inside the station, WDAS, the first two auditioning groups played without much emotion or skill, and Jim grew impatient. Fighting the storm might have been a waste of time. But as he looked through the smoky studio glass at the final group, he changed his mind.
The young woman he had seen in the parking lot battling the snowstorm stood surrounded by the five military cadets. Maybe, he thought, all was not lost. Her petite figure was miniature-mature, but she was still a young girl. Bending slightly at her tiny waist, she shook her long, wet hair free of snow. She had olive skin and wore a short, black sheath skirt, a low-neck mohair sweater, and high, black leather boots.
Sensing someone watching me, I straightened up, glanced through the glass, and caught the intense stare of the man who had smiled at me in the parking lot. I felt as if he were undressing me with his eyes. I tugged on my skirt self-consciously and pushed up the sleeves of my oversized sweater.
I was the new lead singer of the Rum Runners, a band comprised of military cadets and the last group to audition that evening. I had met the group just a few weeks before the audition, when I performed some songs at the Pennsylvania Military College with two high school boys. After our performance at the college, Ty, the leader of the Rum Runners, told me they were looking for a strong female singer and asked me to join their band.
As our group approached the studio microphone, I stole another glance at my judge, absorbing everything about him: starched, light blue Oxford shirt, navy V-neck sweater, neatly ironed khaki pants, and thick, curly dark hair. Most of all, I was drawn to his eyes. They were large, brown, sad, and inviting. I couldn’t keep myself from staring at him. Distracted by his gaze, I missed my cue but then picked it up easily.
Jim stared at me attentively. The only discordant notes came from my guitar, which was badly out of tune. After singing a few numbers, the Rum Runners launched into a long instrumental.
Finally, the number ended, and we started to pack up our instruments. The judge got up quickly and rushed into the studio so fast he tripped over a microphone cord, but caught his balance just in front of me and extended his hand. He seemed suddenly tongue-tied and awkward.
“Have you ever considered singing rock ’n’ roll?” he blurted out. “I think you’d be great.”
Before I could answer, he asked my name.
“Ingrid Jacobson,” I said, trying to hide my excitement but smiling. “Do you really think so?” I tried to appear as cool as possible. I was only sixteen and didn’t even know this guy’s name, yet I was captivated by him.
“Come on, Jim,” Tommy said, anxious to make the decision on the tryouts and get home. It was already past 1 AM.
“I think you made the cut,” Jim said, and winked at me.
One of the cadets put his arm around me and told me I did great.
“See you at the contest,” Jim said, leaving the studio, unwilling to fight the military for my attention.
_____
The Giant Hootenanny Contest was part of the biggest concert festival of the year in Philadelphia, showcasing folk groups from more than fifty universities and high schools. The official program featured the Coventry Lads on the cover. Jim’s clean-shaven face grinned from the corner of the cover photo. He was dressed in a sweater and button-down shirt, and his hair was cropped close. Tommy and the others in the group, including Tim Hauser, who would later go on to form the popular jazz vocal group the Manhattan Transfer, were all dressed the same.
By noon, a large crowd filled the Convention Center. Performers gathered anxiously in the hallways, tuning their instruments and waiting for their turn. Few had ever played in front of a crowd of thousands. The intimidating hall was a theater-in-the-round, and the stage seemed dwarfed by the tower of seats that rose all around it.
The charged atmosphere excited Jim as he sat down at the judges’ table near the stage. But as the afternoon wore on, tedium began to set in. Most of the groups played the same songs. By 3 PM he had heard “Lemon Tree,” “The Cruel War,” and “500 Miles” more than a dozen times. When Esther Halpern, a professional singer and co-owner of the local Gilded Cage Coffee House, played during intermission, Jim ducked outside for a quick smoke and some well-earned silence.
He squeezed through the crowd of musicians and spotted me, kneeling in a corner, frantically trying to tune my guitar.
He approached me, but I didn’t look up. He hesitated for a moment, taking a long look at my short white dress. It had black sleeves and black stripes running up the sides.
Jim laughed out loud.
“Hey!” he said, “You look like a little skunk!”
I was terribly disappointed.
I had been unable to forget him after our meeting almost a month earlier and was hoping I would see him at the hootenanny. I had borrowed the dress from an older friend thinking it would make me look grown-up and sexy.
Seeing my hurt expression, Jim knew he had blown it. He looked down and grimaced. “Is everything okay?” he asked weakly.
“I’m just trying to tune this damn guitar,” I said, turning away.
His remark had crushed me. I had always been insecure about my appearance. Having grown up with a beautiful mother and voluptuous fraternal twin sister, I never felt I measured up. I took after my father, with my small, muscular frame, slender face, and straight hair.
In a desperate attempt to recover, Jim motioned to my battered guitar.
“Can I help you tune it?” The guitar was a cheap, off-brand Japanese model. He wondered whether it would tune at all.
“No, I can do it myself,” I said. I struggled with the strings, but his presence made it impossible for me to concentrate. Distracted and frustrated, I gave up. “There. That’s close enough,” I said. “I have to go now—everybody’s waiting for me.”
“Can I see you later?” he asked.
“I don’t know. Maybe.” I wanted to see him, but I didn’t know if he really liked me or just liked making fun of me. I walked away.
As I reached the door, Jim called out, “Hey, Ingrid! You look terrific! . . . Good luck!”
I spun around, beaming, and waved energetically.
Moments later, as the Rum Runners approached the stage, Jim came up beside me. Without saying a word he reached for my guitar, bent on one knee, and quickly tuned it. Rising, he handed it back to me, winked, and disappeared into the crowd.
The audience quieted as we stepped into position. Everyone expected another rendition of a tired tune, but I slowly laid my guitar on the floor and stepped up to the microphone. In a dramatic fashion, mimicking Mamie Van Doren in the movie Teacher’s Pet with the song “The Girl Who Invented Rock ’n’ Roll,” I stood between two tall cadets and placed a hand on each of their shoulders. In a breathy voice, I began to sing:
You’ve heard of instant coffee,
You’ve heard of instant tea,
Well, you just cast your lit
tle o’ eyes on little o’ instant me.
I turned, looked back over one shoulder, and shimmied seductively, inducing a roar from the audience. Then the Rum Runners played an inspired version of “The Midnight Special,” the planned introduction to our set. I picked up my guitar and joined in on the chorus.
Jim later told me that my surprise introduction and strong vocals had earned the Rum Runners first place in the Best Performance category.
After the show, when Jim came to look for me in the post-hootenanny chaos, my father was embracing me warmly, while my twin sister, Phyllis, stood by smiling and admiring the uniformed cadets. Several other guys from the audience, folk singers, and a couple of judges also lingered nearby, waiting to talk to me.
Jim broke through the crowd and waited while I signed an autograph. He asked if we could talk and then led me to a quiet corner, where he looked straight into my eyes.
“I love your voice. Do you think we could sing together sometime? I mean, I think our voices would blend well. I’d love to sing harmony with you. Maybe I could call you and set up a time so we could practice.”
I beamed inside but coolly teased him with a shrug.
“I’ll think about it,” I said with a laugh. Sensing him about to pull away, I quickly added, “I’d love to.” My steady voice belied the chills vibrating through me. We exchanged phone numbers and reluctantly said good night.
On the way home, I sat in the back seat with Phyllis, who peppered me with questions about Jim. The only response I gave was a defiant “Hands off.”
From the front seat, my stepmother, Florence, asked, “Honey, what kind of a name is Croce? Do you think he’s Jewish?”
“Who knows and who cares?” I said, daydreaming about Jim’s sexy voice, curly hair, and big brown eyes.
Images of Jim’s appearance, sweet smell, and warm smile dominated my thoughts for days. I wondered if he had a girlfriend. Would he want to play music with me if he knew I was only sixteen? When would he finally call?
Two weeks after the hootenanny, there was still no word from him. Finally, I grew impatient and telephoned his home. Jim’s mother answered.
