My first recital at Brooklyn Academy of Music
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It was Wednesday in Brooklyn, must have been the fall of 1968. I was hanging out on the street the way any eight year kid does after school when along came a gentleman down the block, a talent scout. I noticed him coming from quite a distance because he kept stopping and watching the kids play, then going up to parents and talking to them. I watched this keen looking gentleman, dressed in a herringbone jacket, black slacks and a white shirt and tie. His silver grey hair seemed to glitter in the sun. I especially noticed his classic shoes with white stitching, polished to perfection and wondered if he had gone to the shoe shine parlor known as Tip Tap and Toe right across the street from where I lived on Fulton St. at Troy Ave. This shoe shine parlor was a very important stop for the community, especially on Sunday for the Deacons of local churches. In those days we had something called the Blue Law in Brooklyn which meant there was no alcohol to be sold on that day. But from my window on practically every Sunday morning you could watch the lines of men leading into Tip Tap and Toe, I thought to have their shoes shined. But Tip Tap and Toe, the owners, who were once a Vaudeville act by the same name, would play jazz on Sunday, pop their shoe shine rags to the rhythm and do a time step as they sold Dixie cups of booze to their patrons. But on this particular Wednesday there were few patrons and a man in the herringbone coat approached me and asked “young man, are your parents at home?” I, in my eight year old voice said “Yeah, she’s up there” and pointed to the third floor. With that he turned on his heels and headed up to the top floor of our building to meet my mother Pauline Vereen. My father, James Vereen was at work. He worked in the day at a paint factory and my mother worked at night cleaning theaters. Fifteen minutes after he arrived my mother leaned out the window and summoned me upstairs. Walking into the kitchen of our four room Pullman, or railroad, apartment I heard the gentleman telling my mother about this dance school. With that, he reached down, took my leg and tested my flexibility, telling my mother how talented I was and how I could be a big star on TV by enrolling in the Star Time Dance School, which he represented. All she had to do was buy me a pair of tap shoes and pay the large tuition which we could not afford. But Pauline had a dream for this little boy that even his little eyes couldn’t see at the time. Somehow she afforded those tap shoes and the tuition and off I went to Star Time Dance Studio, my introduction to the arts and the beginning of a marvelous journey. I never learned much about dance at this school but I did learn the passion which touched my heart and is instilled in me to this day.
