Paul Storfer has quite a tale to tell: “My father, Herb Storfer ’44, passed away six years ago, in September 2007. Dad was an avid jazz pianist in his spare time and co-founded the Jazz Foundation of America (www.jazzfoundation.org), a program to preserve jazz as a uniquely American art form, and whose Jazz Musician’s Emergency Fund has served, and saved, many musicians in need. It is a fine legacy to a wonderful man, and I am a proud son.
“Four years ago I was visiting my father-in-law in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, for Father’s Day. During the visit my son was trying to show his grandfather how he could get the Internet on his cell phone. He went to YouTube on the phone and showed him how he could search for videos on a particular subject. He put in our last name, Storfer, and up popped a number of listings. To my surprise, one of the first listings was a recording of my wife and me, singing with some friends.
“However, when I went to look at the listing I saw a few other videos underneath. There were a series of videos, tagged with our last name Storfer that promised to be recordings of the Dartmouth Barbary Coast Orchestra. I listened to one; and to my surprise and delight found it was a Barbary Coast recording from 1942, tagged with my father’s name, as he was the group’s pianist. One number featured singing and the great big-band sound, but solo piano and group vocals. The style was inimitably my father’s. Hearing my father play the piano through YouTube, on a recording that I doubt he even knew existed, and having him come back to me on Father’s Day is a memory I will long cherish. If interested, check out https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uotav0n91sk. For a picture of the orchestra from the 1943 Aegis, with all the recordings, check http://78records.cdbpdx.com/BCO/.
“I contacted the person who posted the recordings and he mentioned that he found the recordings at a yard sale in Oregon. They are old 78-rpm recordings and, as they were recorded during the war when vinyl was scarce, the records were glass with a thin coating of vinyl. That these recordings, manufactured in Hanover and found in Oregon, survived six decades is unusual enough. That someone transferred them to YouTube and tagged them is a wonderful thing. That I was able to reconnect with my dad, on Father’s Day no less, seemed to me to be nothing short of a minor miracle.”
—John T. Bird, 1920 Chateau Circle, Apt. 306, Birmingham, AL 35209: (205) 276-4609; jtbird.com@gmail.com
