Gene Yevich Memorial Concert Celebrates Louis Armstrong

On Friday evening, May 10, I attended a wonderful event in Scranton. I normally would not report on a one-off such as this, but once I learned that it occurs annually, I decided it was worth telling you about. Just recognize that the program varies year to year, so next year’s offering could be something entirely different. The annual Gene Yevich Memorial Concert at the University of Scranton honors a former city fire chief, who was also a musician and singer and had friendships with quite a few jazz notables of his time, including the writer George Avakian. Gene’s widow Julie was in attendance, and their daughter, Cheryl Yevich Boga, is the Director of Performance Music at the university and the mother of trumpeter Joe Boga, a graduate of Juilliard who lives in New York. Joe is a member of Adrian Cunningham’s band and is a regular sub with Vince Giordano’s Nighthawks. Music clearly runs deep in that family: Joe’s sister Magdalyn is on the Performance Music staff and the history department faculty at Scranton. The evening’s program honored Louis Armstrong, so what better way to do that than to have David Ostwald’s Armstrong Eternity Band perform, and include a narrated audio-video show by Armstrong archivist Ricky Riccardi. Ricky is the author of What a Wonderful World, covering Louis’s later years, as well as a second book now in the editing stage. The Eternity