A Visit with Domingo Mancuello

Although pianist Domingo Mancuello (pronounced Man-KWAY-o) lives only three miles from me (but not for long—see below), I did not meet him here in Lancaster. It was most likely at the Central Pennsylvania Ragtime and Old American Music Festival, which is normally held in the early fall in Orbisonia, PA. Orby, and the adjacent community of Rockhill Furnace, are the home of the East Broad Top Railroad, a short-line tourist road that represents another of Domingo’s passions, trains. Domingo grew up near Kennett Square in Chester County, PA. His father, a native of Paraguay, is a landscape contractor. His mother became a Spanish teacher and is now the foreign language department head at a local high school. They met when she was in the Peace Corps in South America. His father spoke no English before he came here and his mother only learned Spanish after meeting her husband-to-be. Domingo attended the University of the Arts in center-city Philadelphia. After graduation he apprenticed at the Walnut Street Theater, a few blocks from the campus, and for the past six years has been with the Fulton Theater in Lancaster, one of the nation’s oldest continuously operating theaters. Starting as a production assistant, he has advanced to stage manager. Because the pandemic has temporarily closed the Fulton, Domingo has found another job, which he hopes to continue part-time after the Ful