Stan Getz: Seven Steps To Heaven

Stan Getz plays "Seven Steps To Heaven" for Ollie Shannon and for all those other KV related departed. According to the youtube post this was his last video recording and Stan knew he was living on borrowed time since he had liver cancer (which for a while he had put into a miraculous remission through diet and supplements). People forget how good Stan was. A comment from the posting:

Stan possessed the gift of perfect pitch, sometimes called absolute pitch and it occurs in about one in 10,000 people,and he was one of the best sight readers in the business, also he had an unbelievable photographic memory. I also mentioned before in other comment that the sound he gets is from blowing whole tones for 30min before his lesson when he was young. But most of that beautiful tone that he had also came from his cheeks, as if he had 2 large apples stuck in there.

Oliver Shannon: 3/23/66 Erasmus Defeats Franklin

Oliver Shannon

That's Oliver above, playing for Erasmus, scoring in the 1966 high school championship game against Clinton
Joe Bruno's mentioning of Oliver Shannon triggered some memories, numbered in sequence from different Kvers:

1. I knew an Oliver Shannon in Jr Hi. A black kid, great b-ball player. Is this the same person you mention. And do you know his whereabouts?

2. Now some bravado. Oliver came to "our" park having heard of my speed and challenged me to a race. I had "school" shoes still on and he had sneakers. I easily beat him. Another time some Italian "kid" also came to challenge me-he was from the Bronx or Brooklyn and looked real tough. Well the result was the same I easily beat him and he shook my hand and said "you won fair and square".

3. I have listened to the tales of Marvin K speeding up and down the asphalt, taking all comers from all neighborhoods and sending them on the impecunious ways besmirched and bedraggled, festooned in defeat and despair. And to o’ercome the human foe is grand and ne’er do I contest it. But I, in no less titanic a tussle have rebuked the grandest adversary of them all-–Father Time himself. Hear me now oh you from KV come. My daily journey around the Central Park of Manahatta runs up and down hill but always from North to South along the western ridge and then due up the Eastern byway. Just so, as the arrows point the path. Yet today I sought to run my duo-pedaled steed down the eastern and up the western drives, thus reversing the direction of traffic and, in effect, biding my pace betwixt and between the rungs of oncoming cyclists and motorists. Backwards did I run my race, you brethren. And for all the time I sped, spinning backwards, I out-pointed my previous best by a full 79 seconds. Around the entire park with time to spare. I beat my best time backwards. Say it with me please, he beat the best backward. And the best of the mightiest. Father Time himself stood speechless by the park exit and dipped his brow into the Harlem Meer, he was spent but now unencumbered by the mantle of invincibility that he once so proudly sported. Do you see what I’m saying here/ Can you make it out clearly oh yee of KV come?

4. Would you be kind enough to repeat that?

I looked to find an address and phone number for an Oliver Shannon. The one suspect I found in North Carolina wasn't him. In searching the Social Security Death Index I found an Oliver Shannon, born 9/29/47, and passed away 9/21/01. The card was issued in NYC and had numbers that corresponded to a lower east side location. This prompted this email to the chatterers.

Looks like Oliver Shannon may have lost the race we all will eventually lose, only looks like he lost in the trials at age 54

1. Very sad about Ollie. He passed 10 days after 9/11--I wonder if it had anything to do with the Twin Towers. Ollie signed my elementary school yearbook, played one year on my Edgies team--went on to star for Erasmus Hall on their city championship team with Coak Cannon and George Thompson and starred in the Rucker league, then played for the Cincinnati Royals for a year or two. Genuinely sweet guy.

2. He had that sleeper play where he would fall down at the key and writhe as if in agony and when people gathered around him he would dribble in and lay the ball up. Willowy and always smiling.  I can't even remember talking to him but I remember his presence very clearly.  A dominating player but a gentle soul. Poetry in motion. An idiosyncratic personality but a true as gravity eye. God bless Oliver Shannon.

KV Sports' Chatter

From Joe Bruno, who unfortunately has no pics from those days:

I PLAYED SECOND BASE FOR TRANSFIGURATION CHURCH IN 1960, WHEN WE WON THE TWO BRIDGES LITTLE LEAGUE TITLE BEATING ST. JAMES IN THE CHAMPIONSHIP GAME. VINNIE ADIMONDO WAS OUR PITCHER AND RAY WILLIAMS WAS THE PITCHER FOR ST JAMES. I FORGET THE SCORE.
ALSO ON OUR TEAM WAS CATCHER VINCENT MOSCO, THE SON OF FRANK MOSCO, OUR COACH. FRANK WAS ALSO THE UNCLE OF VINNIE ADIMONDO. FRANK'S WIFE AND VINNIE'S MOTHER WERE SISTERS. VINNIE'S UNCLE JUNIOR ADIMONDO, MARRIED MY COUSIN JUDY PALATTO, WHICH MAKES VINNIE AND I COUSINS THROUGH MARRIAGE. VINNIE, AMAZINGLY, IS TWO YEARS YOUNGER THAN ME. BUT HE LOOKED TWO YEARS OLDER.
THAT YEAR, THE TWO BRIDGES ALL STAR TEAM PLAYED AN ALL STAR TEAM FROM NEW JERSEY AT COLEMAN OVAL. VINNIE ADIMONDO, VINCENT MOSCO AND MYSELF REPRESENTED TRANSFIGURATION. ALSO ON THE TEAM WAS TEDDY GRAFF, JOEY EGAN AND OLIVER SHANNON FROM ST. JAMES. LITTLE JOE, BOBBY D, CARL SCARNA JR. AND TOMMY RED REPRESENTED ST. JOSEPH. I FORGET WHO THE REST OF OUR ALL STAR TEAM WAS.
WHAT I DO REMEMBER WAS THAT I STARTED THE GAME AT SECOND BASE AND THEN PLAYED THREE INNINGS IN CENTER FIELD. WE WON THE GAME BIG AND TOMMY RED HIT A COUPLE OF HOMERS. VINNIE ADIMONDO WAS THE WINNING PITCHER.
VINNIE WAS ALSO THE QUARTERBACK ON OUR TOUCH FOOTBALL TEAM THAT PLAYED IN COLUMBUS PARK. IT WAS AN EIGHT MAN SHIFT LEAGUE. CENTER, 2 LINEMAN. TWO ENDS. QUARTERBACK AND TWO HALFBACKS.
THERE WERE EIGHT TEAMS IN THE LEAGUE. THE OTHER SEVEN TEAM'S AVERAGE AGE WAS 25-30.
I WAS 16, VINNIE WAS 14. OUR OLDEST AND BIGGEST PLAYER WAS SKIPPER (ALAN MCCRAY), WHO WAS 18 YEARS OLD AND MAYBE 170 POUNDS. HE CAME FROM THE 4TH WARD BUT PLAYED FOR US.
WHEN WE APPLIED TO ENTER THE LEAGUE, WE WERE TURNED DOWN BECAUSE THEY SAID WE WERE TOO YOUNG AND TOO SMALL.
THERE WERE TWO TEAMS FROM THE 4TH WARD. AN OLDER TEAM FROM COLUMBUS PARK. ONE FROM JAMES CENTER. ONE FROM GRAND STREET NEAR THE FDR. ANOTHER FROM CHRISTIE STREET. AND ANOTHER FROM ST. PATRICK'S NEAR HOUSTON ST.
IN OUR FIRST YEAR (1963, WE WON THE CHAMPIONSHIP, GOING UNDEFEATED IN 14 GAMES. WE HAD SPEED BURNERS LIKE LOUIS MINGIONE, PETER CAMINITI, LOUIE PACE AND MYSELF. SKIPPER MAY HAVE BEEN OUR FASTER PLAYER AND HE PLAYED LINEMAN, BECAUSE HE WAS OUR HEAVIEST PLAYER.
OUR STRATEGY WAS SIMPLE.
VINNIE ADIMONDO, PLAYING QUATERBACK, WOULD SCRAMBLE UNTIL ONE OF US GOT OPEN. THEN WITH HIS RIFLE ARM, HE WOULD FIRE THE BALL TO EITHER, PETER CAMINITI, LOUIS PACE, LOUIE MINGIONE OR MYSELF. IF NOBODY GOT OPEN, VINNIE WOULD SCRAMBLE FOR A TOUCHDOWN. THE FIELD WAS 50 YARDS LONG, AND VINNIE COULD FIRE THE BALL 50 YARDS WITH A FLICK OF THE WRIST. AND HE WAS ONLY 14 YEARS OLD.
SOMETIMES, LARRY VENTURATO WOULD PLAY QUARTERBACK, AND VINNIE WOULD PLAY HALFBACK. THE HALFBACK OPTION PASS WAS THEN IN PLAY.
WE WON ALL OUR GAMES BY LARGE MARGINS AND THE BIGGER GUYS ON THE OTHER TEAMS WOULD GET FRUSTRATED AND SOMETIME ROUGH US UP. THAT'S WHEN SKIPPER, OR MY COUSIN JOHNNY PALATTO (A LINEMAN) WOULD STEP IN AS ENFORCERS.
ASK ANYONE WHO PLAYED IN THAT LEAGUE. IT WAS TWO-HAND TOUCH, BUT AS TOUGH AS ANY TACKLE LEAGUE AROUND. AND WE PLAYED ON CONCRETE. LOTS OF BUSTED LIPS AND SKINNED LEGS.
WHAT WERE WE THINKING? WE COULD HAVE GOTTEN KILLED.