Photo from Jimmy LaRocca: Remains from "Old" Salaparuta

As I reported two stories below, Salaparuta, Sicily suffered its own Katrina in 1968 in the form of a massive earthquake. It destroyed the entire town and made the whole population of 3,000 people homeless.

The people who returned after the disaster rebuilt the town in a different location. Today the new town is prospering, and it has a new cultural center called the "Nick" LaRocca New Orleans Jazz Cultural Arts Center. It is attached to the auditorium, the "Nick" LaRocca Concert Hall.

The "Old" Salaparuta is just ruins today. The photo here from Jimmy LaRocca is a small piece of the floor from a destroyed church in "Old" Salaparuta which he acquired on a trip to Sicily in 1999.

Like Katrina in New Orleans, the earthquake of Salaparuta makes us realize what we have lost, and that we should never take things for granted.

To learn more about the "New" Salaparuta and the new Jazz cultural center, see www.odjb.com

Thanks again to Mr. Jimmy LaRocca for the great photograph.

--Adrian

Photos from Jimmy LaRocca: ODJB and the First Jazz Recording Ever

These two great photographs come to this blog courtesy of Jazz musician/bandleader Mr. Jimmy LaRocca himself. After doing research on Salaparuta and its amazing connections to Jazz in New Orleans, I emailed Mr. LaRocca for information. He was kind enough to send to this blog three excellent pictures which I am posting here and above. The first photo is of The Original Dixieland Jazz Band with"Nick" LaRocca, Jimmy's father, on cornet when they were in New York in 1917.

The photo of the record is of the first Jazz song EVER recorded by anybody. It is "Livery Stable Blues" recorded in New York by the Original Dixieland Jazz Band (ODJB) with "Nick" LaRocca -- Victor #18255. It sold over 1,000,000 copies in 1917. As Mr. Jimmy wrote, "It was recorded February 26, 1917 and released March 7, 1917. It's the recording that changed forever how music would be interpreted."

"Nick" LaRocca was born in New Orleans, but his father was born in Salaparuta, Sicily. Mr. Jimmy LaRocca follows in the footsteps and leads the ODJB today. Read much more about the tremendous influence of the LaRocca's on New Orleans Jazz and connections to Salapuruta at http://www.odjb.com/

Mr. Jimmy also pointed out something else to me that we will see more of on this site later. The Sicilian immigrants not only influenced New Orleans music, but they also absolutely influenced New Orleans' great food. Another point he made is that many of the early Jazz musicians in New Orleans were actually Sicilian. What could be more New Orleans than great food and great music? Yes, we have a lot to thank Sicily for if we really love New Orleans.

Once again, our profound thanks go to Mr. Jimmy LaRocca for sending us these great photographs.

--Adrian

Salaparuta

The levees did not break in Salaparuta; the earth did. For this small town in western Sicily, January 26, 1968 was the same as August 29, 2005 for us in New Orleans, the day Hurricane Katrina came. During the night of January 26 a massive earthquake tore through the town and the nearby region. A village that had existed for 900 years was totally destroyed in a matter of 30 seconds. All of the ancient, historic buildings lay in ruins. The 3000 inhabitants of Salaparuta now had to wait on the slopes of a hill for the quake to pass. When the land finally became quiet again, the entire town was left homeless. The people eventually did rebuild their 900 year old town, but not in the same place. Many of the citizens left the town for good, but some returned. Again, in its own way, it was like Katrina.

(See http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0.9171.837724.00%20html )

People had been leaving Salaparuta for a long, long time, however, long before the 1968 catastrophe. In the 1800's people left because of poverty and civil instability. Some went elsewhere in Sicily or Italy or in the Mediterranean region. Others sailed across the Atlantic to America's eastern seaboard and New York City. But some came here to New Orleans.

From some research I did, I recognized some of the last names of families from Salaparuta who came to America since the late 1800's and specifically to New Orleans -- Palumbo, Bruno, Cangialosi, Capo, DiMaggio, Drago, Ippolito, Lupo, Mandina, Navarra, Oliveri, Prima, Russo, Trapani, and Giarraputto. (See www.graffagnino.com/familytree/salaparu.htm )

Among the multitudes of poor, desperate Sicilian immigrants was a man who, seemingly, had no connection whatsoever to New Orleans and its unique culture of exquisite foods, priceless architecture, and the only truly unique art form ever created in America, namely, Jazz. This impoverished son of Salaparuta was named Girolamo LaRocca who married Vita DeNina, also of Sicily. They immigrated to New Orleans, where many Sicilians faced strong discrimination initially, and had a son named Dominic, who was called "Nick" for short. And "Nick" LaRocca became one of the most famous and most significant Jazz cornet (trumpet) players and Jazz bandleaders in all of New Orleans history. He became the director of the Original Dixieland Jazz Band which sprang from New Orleans but influenced Jazz across the country in Chicago and New York.

The Original Dixieland Jazz Band (ODJB) is credited with the first ever recording of a Jazz song, "Livery Stable Blues," which was recorded in 1917 and which made the band internationally famous. The ODJB was also said to be the first Jazz band to tour Europe before a large audience, and this made Jazz extremely popular there to this very day.

Nick LaRocca died in the early 1960's but his son still continues the tradition of New Orleans Jazz with the ODJB. (See http://www.odjb.com/) The mayor of New Orleans sent a letter to Salaparuta acknowledging the historic ties between the two cities. Lt. Gov. Kathleen Blanco of Louisiana sent a certificate to the mayor of Salaparuta for honoring New Orleans Jazz music. (Again see www.odjb.com which has copies of the letter and the certificate online.)

In August 2008, three years after Katrina, a Jazz center -- Nick LaRocca Cultural Arts Center -- was established in Salaparuta in honor of Nick LaRocca and his family who helped connect that small town in Sicily, which was destroyed by an earthquake, to a large city in America, New Orleans, which was devastated by a hurricane.

But earthquakes, hurricanes, immigration, exile, poverty, prejudice and every other hardship known to woman or man could not stop the beat of the drum and sound of the cornet and a genuine love for music which exists like no place else on Planet Earth except for New Orleans ... and Salaparuta.

--Adrian

(Note: The ODJB photo above is in public domain from Wikimedia Commons. "Nick"is playing the cornet in the photo, third from the left. The certificate from Lt. Gov. Blanco appears with permission of Mr. Jimmy LaRocca and is from the attachments file at www.odjb.com)

Palermo: Gen. Patton and WW2

Here's one more thing to add about Sicily and Palermo: Not only did Sicilians come to America, but Americans once went to Sicily. In this case it was between 12 July and 17 August, 1943 in what was called Operation Husky. The British 8th Army under Bernard Montgomery and the US 7th Army under the famous Gen. George S. Patton invaded the island and drove out the Nazis.

Although the Itlalian Army was present and did some fighting, it was clear that the average Italian soldier, and certainly the vast majority of civilians, did not like the Germans and did like the Allies; especially they loved the Americans. As a result large numbers of Italian troops quickly surrended to Patton's Army, and Gen. Patton was warmly welcomed as a liberating hero in the streets of Palermo. I am not certain how many US soldiers from New Orleans were present in this operation, if any. That, of course, is a detailed research question. A good source of information on the invasion of Sicily would be the National World War ll Museum in New Orleans. (The museum began as the D-Day Museum and has grown over time. See http://www.ddaymuseum.org/)

After taking Palermo (which, by the way, Patton did on his own without orders), the general drove to the Straits of Messina trying to trap the Nazi Army on the island of Sicily. But the Germans escaped and went to mainland Italy where they would fight again until the war's end.

In the photos above we see a team of US soldiers with a mortar as they fire on German positions near Palermo. The next photo shows Gen. Montgomery and Gen. Patton shaking hands in the liberated city of Palermo. In reality, they did not like each other very much, as was shown in the famous movie with George C. Scott. Lastly, is a US Army map showing the movements of the US troops in the invasion of Sicily. Palermo is in the middle at the top. (Note: Both photos and the map are in public domain and at Wikimedia Commons.)

-- Adrian