Off The Cuff With The Geator!

By Art Connor

Philly loves their music scene, and no name is more synonymous with the scene than Jerry Blavat, the Geator with the Heator, the Boss with the Hot Sauce! Starting out as a kid coming from the tough streets of South Philly sixty-plus years ago, he was one of the regular dancers on the original Bandstand when it was still based here in Philadelphia. From there Jerry’s career began its meteoric rise, touching almost all facets of the entertainment industry — radio and club DJ, TV host, recording artist, band leader, Hollywood actor, entrepreneur, night club owner and more recently, a critically acclaimed author. His long career in the music and entertainment business has left many awestruck, and yes, many have jealously coveted it as well.

Jerry celebrated his 78th birthday this past July, but he looks and acts twenty years younger. He religiously adheres to a strict diet and fitness regimen, and has an insane work and business schedule that would burn out guys less than half his age. Whether he is performing in front of a sold-out show at the Kimmel Center, playing at his own night club, Memories in Margate, or DJ’ng at a neighborhood block party for a charity fund raiser, Jerry always gives it his all, and fans both young and old love it. He has that same thrill performing in front an audience just as he did when he was an eighteen-year-old kid. Catching up with him on a stormy afternoon late this summer at the Hard Rock Café in Atlantic City, he commented on what it is about the music biz that still drives him, makes him want to get up and go to work every day.

“It’s very obvious, seeing of all these wonderful folks here tonight who are smiling and laughing. They dance, they go back to when they were young, and for a few hours they relive their youth again. This music takes them to a better place, a different, gentler time. The music I play is timeless and ageless. It’s the people that drive me — this is why I do this every day.”

Throughout the ‘60s and the craziness of the British Invasion, Jerry was doing his own self-funded radio shows, playing “golden oldies” long before the industry coined a phrase for the format. He was also performing live at his many record hops throughout the tri-state area, where he truly connected with his fans, dancing with them and doing his famous Geator “raps and rhymes” over the records he played, light years before rap was even considered a music genre. By 1967, bands like the Beatles, the Doors, Jefferson Airplane and the new psychedelic sounds coming out of San Francisco were ruling the airwaves. The Summer of Love and the Viet Nam War dominated the nightly news headlines. The world of pop music found itself radically changing to mirror the volatile times, and AM radio was frantically trying to keep up.

Despite all of this, Jerry was still able to “keep the kids on their feet with songs that had that dancing beat!” He even had his own syndicated TV shows spotlighting more of the chart-topping R&B and Motown acts of the day, rarely touching on the heavier rock scene, almost as if the new changes weren’t happening. We fast forward to the late ‘70s, at the very height of the Disco era. People were once again getting dressed up and going back to the clubs and dancing again, but it seemed different. Or was it? The irony is some of those songs which were considered risqué and strange forty years ago are now “golden oldies” that Jerry has incorporated into his live shows. I asked Jerry how he originally felt about the first wave of the disco scene.

“I did the disco movement — I was a part of it! I did a TV show over at the old Winners Circle in New Jersey called Discophonic Scene ’79 that featured Rick James, Gloria Gaynor, the Trammps, and Teddy Pendergrass. So the real secret of music is music! It doesn’t have to be labeled. If it’s danceable — whether it’s something from the ’50s or ’60s, the ’70s or ’90s, or even today — I will be there as long as God gives me the strength to dance. I can tap dance if you start to whistle. So whatever it is, I will still be dancing because it is what I love to do.”

All through his entire career, Jerry has worked with or has been in the company of so many famous people and celebrities, from the early rock and roll legends to the Hollywood elite. He befriended the likes of Sammy Davis Jr., Frank Sinatra, Dick Clark, and publishing magnate and U.S. Ambassador to England Walter Annenberg. He has met with various members of the British royal family. The queens of Motown, Diana Ross and the Supremes, appeared live on his television show, the one and only time they ever appeared on a local program. So with all of this great history, who would he like to work with that he hasn’t already, and who does he regret not having had the chance to work with and unfortunately never will?

“Well, now that’s a toughie because of the fact that I’ve basically worked with all of them — Aretha, James Brown, Fats Domino, Little Richard, Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis, Sammy Davis Jr.,” Jerry replies. He collects his thoughts for a mere millisecond and then says, “I think today, I would be happy to work with a kid called Bruno Mars. He’s got a certain something, a certain feel.”

His answer surprised some of the crowd at the Hard Rock Café, getting a few gasps and applause.

(Note: In Jerry’s autobiography, You Only Rock Once he tells a hilarious story of booking Chuck Berry to appear at his night club Memories in Margate back in the early ’70s, one of the many great stories from his amazing book.)

Jerry has won many awards for his work in the music business and his work in charity, including his induction into the broadcasters wing of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (yep, the big one out in Cleveland, Ohio), and the Congressional Horizon Award, presented to him for his influence on young people over the years. He has a street named after him in Wildwood, New Jersey, and he has a brass plaque honoring him in his own home town right on Philly’s famous Avenue of The Arts. This summer he was voted “Philly’s Best Icon,” beating out the “Rocky” statue by readers of the ever trendsetting Philadelphia Magazine.

Of course there is the brand — the electric smile, the clothes, the hats, the finger snapping, the jive talking rapid-fire “rhyme on a dime” raps and the dancing. There will always be the dancing. And with that comes his love of music. People tend to forget that Jerry is quite the music historian, and he has an encyclopedic knowledge of early rock and roll and doo wop groups. He’s been at this now for over sixty years. Two great Frank Sinatra songs, “That’s Life” and “My Way,” could very well be Jerry’s theme songs, yet he prefers “The Impossible Dream.” So what would he like his legacy to be? On that stormy late summer afternoon standing on the Hard Rock’s stage, this is what he had to say:

“For people to remember that I followed my passion. My passion began when I was 13 years old, when I saw people dancing and I said, ‘I wanna dance!’ But starting with my dancing, I was able to do what I wanted to do, and I saw the happy faces of the people that would come out and see me. My legacy should always be that I was just a little guy and by the grace of God I followed my dream and my passion, and I did not allow anybody to stop me.”

Jerry pauses for a moment and then faces his audience, and with his arm outstretched in a very biblical Charlton Heston like fashion, he continues to say  —

“These are the people, the public, who have given me my success. My legacy belongs to the people; let them be the judge.”

I think the people and fans have long passed judgment many years ago. And that judgment is — “Jerry… you’re the best!”

Off The Cuff With The Geator! – The Jerry Blavat Interview ©2018 by Art Connor. All rights reserved.