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The Palladium Has a Thousand Stories – Part 6

'JOE KILLER'

By Michael Terrace & Peter Settimelli
From New York City

My personal knowledge of Killer Joe Piro is chiefly confined to memory of the “teen” dance shows of my adolescence as seen broadcast in black-and-white on New York Independent TV back in the middle of the 1960’s.

If asked to name what I thought to be the most prepossessing of Joe’s accomplishments, I’d say (as might many of my flamboyant generation), “being on the same bill as the Beatles at Shea Stadium in ‘65.”
While certainly a career-defining item on any entertainer’s resume, fortunately for the sake of history and the arts there is one wholly more informed on the subject than me, one who knew Killer Joe Piro firsthand before and during his celebrity.

As I now pass to Michael Terrace, may I say great thanks to you all for reading – Pete S

Frank “Killer Joe” Piro was born March 2, 1921 in New York City and raised in the East Harlem section of Manhattan. Growing up in this gritty, predominantly, Italian-American neighborhood taught him to stand up for himself, learn to fight and keep himself out of harm’s way.
As his interest in music and dance developed, Joe also learned self-discipline necessary to cultivate his apparent dance talent at Upper Manhattan’s Club Savoy and the Chester Palace.

Located in the Bronx, the Chester Palace was a traditional ballroom providing live orchestra music. Joe proved to be a natural whether dancing the Fox Trot or its faster, more rhythmic counterpart, the Peabody, at that he also excelled.
It is at the Savoy where bandleaders Count Basie and Duke Ellington led ensembles that played `swing’ and Joe, a frequent patron, came to be regarded among its top ‘Lindy Hoppers’.

This says a great deal since the Savoy had some of the greatest Lindy dancers in the world.
When the Second World War broke out, Joe enlisted in the United States Navy. In addition to fulfilling his duties as a sailor, Joe entertained solo or with a partner at every post to that he was assigned he and went out of his way to teach and instill in the enlisted men and women the joy of dancing.
Whether in New York or the Hollywood canteens, Joe’s talent as a Jitterbug dancer made him the toast of the Navy.

Receiving an honorable discharge and a special salute of appreciation from the U. S. Navy, Joe returned to civilian life where dancing became a preoccupation night and day.

I would say that the life of the dance simply sprung from Joe. The Roseland, Savoy and Arcadia ballrooms became his stomping grounds.
In fact, I remember that Joe once joked, “If I miss one week, they send me a get-well card.”

The Rumba was now turning from the box-step to the diamond-step. The time value of the music remained in four beats per measure, although the rhythm changed to match this new variation on the basic pattern. Mario Bauza, bandleader of Machito’s Afro-Cubans, was among the first to compose tunes and write arrangements for the new style called the `mambo’.

Joe was working as a freelance dance instructor when he first heard Machito performing mambo hits such as `Tanga’ and ‘Mambo Inn’ at the China Doll in midtown Manhattan. Enraptured with the music and taken by the audience’s reaction, Joe immediately saw the mambo’s potential and joined its ranks of devotees after taking up the step that he would eventually master.

Meanwhile, entrepreneur and former haberdasher Maxwell Hyman learned of a faltering dancehall on 52nd. Street and Broadway catering to the Lindy Hop crowd that was in search of a new partner.

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