Growing Up With Dion: From "The Wanderer" To Son of Skip James - Page 2

Fall 1961

My oldest sister was 15 and I wasn’t even a year old at the time. My parents were working and my sister was given the task of looking after me on the weekends. I don’t think she was ever crazy about the idea. It really didn’t help her image.  One afternoon she was strolling me home from the park and the usual comments from the neighbourhood would begin.

NEIGHBOR: Hey I never knew you had a baby.      

SISTER: (disgusted) That’s not my baby! He’s my little brother.

NEIGHBOR: Sorry I just thought …

SISTER: (interrupting) Well you thought wrong … Are you for real? … What kind of idiot are you?          

My sister would briskly make her way back home cussing under her breath. As we headed into the house she placed me in the jolly jumper that was in the living room. She was gentle, but I got the impression she would imagine that the apparatus was a slingshot. She would then head to our console turntable smiling with anticipation and play the same LP she’d been playing for weeks on end. The volume was raised really high and you could hear the needle as it hit the vinyl with all its crackle and pops. The room filled with the sound of Dion’s "Runaround Sue."

Then the dancing began. My sister would go into a trance as Dion would takeover our living room. By the time the song "The Wanderer" was heard, this love affair/dance ritual would attract a few of the neighbourhood boys who would line up inconspicuously at the living room window to watch my sister make all her moves. I don’t think that was her intention, but she got attention that’s for sure. I of course would bob and weave with the rhythm in my rig….

Dion DiMucci

was born July 18, 1939, in The Bronx NYC.  His recording career began in 1957 when he brought some of the neighbourhood boys together, naming them The Belmonts after an Avenue in the heart of The Bronx.  Dion and the Belmonts put together a string of hits from 1958-1960 that included songs like, "I Wonder Why" and "Teenager in Love." His band went on tour with such talented artists as The Big Bopper, Ritchie Valens, and Buddy Holly. A last minute decision not to spend $36 dollars to board a plane one frigid night back in February 1959 spared Dion his life. When he learned the following morning that he lost many of his friends in the infamous plane crash, later dubbed The Day the Music Died, it left him sombre and confused.

Article Author: The Blues Blogger

I love music! It was a memorable part of my life growing up in the sixties and continues to be to this day. I recall hearing different genres from every room in our house. However, it was the soulful blues and improvisational jazz texture that would …

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