Meet the Karaoke King of Bay Ridge!

Plus! Weird Trash Photo #30!! More Coffee Thingz!!!

Hello everyone,

Welcome to Issue #139 of CAFÉ ANNE!

Ooooohhhhh nooooos! I am sorry to report that the Bed-Stuy Aquarium, which I wrote up in Issue #137, is no longer with us. Yes, as many have heard, the charming make-shift goldfish pond created by locals from a leaky fire hydrant feeding a sidewalk pit was paved over last week. The city’s Department of Environment Protection came by and now, where there was once dozens of fish and a riot of aquatic decor, there’s just a lousy square of cement. Sad! People, this is why we can’t have silly things.

In other news, last week’s edition of This Week in Coffee spurred some interesting comments. Responding to the theory that regular milk is the new milk when it comes to the trendiest creamer offered in cafés, Rob S. in Fort Greene noted, “I’ve heard camel is the new hot milk.” I thought he was being a goofball, but I googled and it turns out camel’s milk is actually a thing.

As for my complaint about cafés hiding the milk behind the counter, forcing me to be a fusspot when asking baristas to add the right amount of cream to my coffee, Lorie in Brooklyn emailed about a clever solution invented by a fellow New Yorker: “A friend once told me she worked for Calvin Klein, and he liked his coffee a certain way. So he put a Pantone swatch above the coffee maker, and you had to put enough milk into the coffee you were making for him until you matched the Pantone swatch!”

Genius! I’m going to get me a swatch of my own to show the baristas. For the record, I like enough cream in my coffee to make it a Pantone 727:

What’s yours? You can check out the official Pantone color chart here.

Finally, huge coffee-with-the-right-amount-of-cream shoutouts to this week’s new paid subscribers Alan A., Philip D., and Traci T. That’s enough $$$ for 73 coffees plus a chocolate almond croissant! And as you know, while CAFÉ ANNE will always be paywall-free, I cannot continue without the generous support of those who opt to pay—so many thanks!

I am very excited for this week’s issue, of course. We’ve got a new Weird Trash Photo and a visit with Tom Pagano, the Karaoke King of Bay Ridge. Please enjoy.

Regards!

Anne

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Weird Trash Heap #30

I had just arrived in Mill Basin, land of oligarchs and cartel bosses, to report’s last week’s neighborhood profile when I came across a dandy of a trash heap near the marina.

Contents:

• One oversize plastic calculator

• A sideview mirror ripped from a car

• Carton of vinyl synthetic “powder-free” exam gloves (partially used)

• A book: David Baldacci’s Stone Cold

• A half-sleeve of disposable plastic cups

• One citrus slicer

• A modem for dial-up connections

• A tattered dog collar

• One copy of the New York Times, still in its plastic delivery wrapper, dated April 28, 2023

Hoping for insight, I looked up the book. Stone Cold is “An unforgettable novel of revenge, conspiracy and murder that brings a band of unlikely heroes face-to-face with their greatest threat.”

What’s the story behind this one? I’m stumped. Please speculate in the comments or drop me a note: annekadet@yahoo.com.

FEATURE

Meet the Karaoke King of Bay Ridge!

I first saw Tom Pagano perform earlier this fall. I was walking along Brooklyn's Shore Road with a friend when we stopped at a little public plaza overlooking New York Harbor. It took me a minute to notice the middle-aged fellow singing under a canopy of trees. But then I was entranced. And puzzled.

For one thing, the sleepy south end of Bay Ridge is an odd location for a street performer. And the man's baritone was delightfully singular—strong, warm and sometimes independent of the intended melody, though in an endearing way.

And then there was his schtick. Mr. Pagano wasn't playing for tips; he was emcee-ing his own little karaoke party, singing standards, taking requests, and inviting random passersby to join in. When he spotted me gawking from a park bench, he asked me to sing along. "That's okay!" I called back, though I secretly wanted to get in on the fun.

My friend, who lives in Bay Ridge, told me the performer appears on the plaza nearly every weekend. So of course I had to get his number and arrange an interview. What was up with Mr. Pagano?

Last Saturday, I returned to Bay Ridge to watch Mr. Pagano perform again. Walking down Shore Road, I could hear him singing from a block away, "The Wonder of You," an Elvis tune. But even as I drew near, I couldn't see him. The tree canopy had grown so long, all I could make out was his torso and legs dancing under the branches.

I poked my head under the leaves, waved hello to Mr. Pagano and took in the surroundings. A half circle of park benches surrounds the canopy, and about a dozen folks from the neighborhood—mostly oldsters—were enjoying the performance.

Lina, a Russian lady accompanied by her elderly mother and dog Oscar—a Yorkie with one eye and an eight-inch braid sprouting from its skull—said this was not her first time watching Mr. Pagano.

"I think he's wonderful," she said. "It's coming from his soul, I would say. I don't know if he's professional, but it doesn't matter. It's great."

Mr. Pagano announced the next tune: "'I Will Survive,' by Miss Gloria Gaynor!"

"First I was afraid, I was petrified..." he crooned.

Tracey, a home health aide who lives in East New York, took a few minutes to work up her courage before asking Mr. Pagano to sing a duet with her, Conway Twitty's "Don't Cry Joni."

Tom and Tracey

Mr. Pagano tried to get Tracey's patient Barbara to sing a duet as well.

"You know ‘You Don't Bring Me Flowers’?" he asked. "Come on, you can do it!"

Barbara, an elderly lady in a wheelchair, shook her head.

Mr. Pagano tried again with Tracey. “Come on Tracey!" he pressed. "It's a famous duet song. Neil Diamond and Barbara Streisand!"

He started singing it a cappella. "Doesn't ring a bell?" he said. "I can sing 'Sweet Caroline'! That's my go-to song when everyone gets bored and wants to leave."

Tracey declined to sing "Sweet Caroline," and Mr. Pagano continued his unique brand of stage patter: "Sometimes I can tell by the audience that I've been dismissed, without them saying a word. Just reading their body language. Falling asleep, looking at their cell phones. Yawning. Anyway, okay. I'm just joking. The audiences are great. I love it! The energy, it's fabulous. I'm on a pink cloud when I come here. I give myself this chance. Anyway, enough about me. Okay, let's talk about me! I'm only kidding. That's a joke. I don't know where I got that joke. Okay, 'Sweet Caroline,' here we go! Mr. Neil Diamond's in the house!!! Some people say I sound like him. I don't know. I don't hear it. I sound like me!"

He queued up the song and the opening strains of the bouncy tune blared from his battery-powered speaker: "Where it began, I can't begin to know when..."

I later learned it all began when people told Mr. Pagano he couldn't sing.

"Ever since I was young, I always wanted to sing, and my voice was not really good," said Mr. Pagano, who was grew up in Park Slope back when it wasn't a very nice hood. "And, you know, people, they're kind. They don't tell you, but you know, you know."

Actually, they did tell him. Often.

"My mother, when I was younger, she'd put on the music and I'd sing to it, she'd say 'Don't sing. Don't. Don't sing,'" he recalled.

As a teenager, he took voice lessons from a Manhattan instructor. The teacher offered the same advice: "Don't sing. You don't have the ear, you know?"

Mr. Pagano may or may not be tone deaf. So while he later worked as an actor, waiter, house cleaner, painter, bank employee, Old Navy clerk, comedy troupe performer, McDonald's burger flipper and shoe salesman, he didn't do much singing.

"And so I always felt left out," he said. "I always felt like singers have that extra voice, that they could communicate to the heavens, and they have an extra something special."

When Mr. Pagano finished 'Sweet Caroline,' I asked him to perform a duet with me: the Velvet Underground's "After Hours." It's one of my favorite tunes.

Mr. Pagano had never heard the tune, but was game. "Here we go, we'll be a regular Donny and Marie!" he declared.

Our two-minute performance was really quite something:

Mr. Pagano had a set list prepared, so when the requests dried up, he sang his way through Mary Hopkins's "Those Were the Days" and a rousing rendition of "96 Tears" before a mom with two kids wandered onto the make-shift stage. She explained that she and her children were geocaching.

"It's like a scavenger hunt, and there's these hidden things, and you sign your name if you find it," she said. "It's very difficult. I look like a weirdo, I know."

"No, no, no I look like a weirdo!" said Mr. Pagano. "I'm the weirdo here. Get outta here!"

He got another request, Nancy Sinatra's "These Boots are Made for Walking," and followed up with the beautiful Midnight Cowboy theme, "Everybody's Talking," and then "Last Dance,"—the 1978 Donna Summer disco tune.

"He's fun!" said Wanda, a bystander who had wandered into the plaza.

"How would you describe his singing?" I asked.

"Sexy! Virile!" said Wanda's friend Jacob.

Wanda ducked under the canopy and started to do my job for me, peppering Mr. Pagano with questions. He told her he performs nearly every Saturday starting around 2 pm and stays "as long as the crowd will listen to me and not throw tomatoes at me and lettuce."

He usually comes prepared with a set list of 20 tunes, a thermos of lemon juice and water (good for your voice, according to Elton John), a speaker and two mics. He finds the background accompaniments on YouTube, which has karaoke versions of just about every tune in the universe.

"My friend wants to sing with you," said Wanda. "Oh wait, he's leaving!"

Jacob was disappearing down the hill, toward the harbor, with his dog.

Mr. Pagano, eager to perform another duet, started shouting into the mike, and his voice boomed through the neighborhood: "Jacob, Jacob! Jacob please come to aisle four! Jacob come and sing please! Jacob, your friend told me what a magnificent singer you are!"

While we waited for Jacob, Mr. Pagano tried to talk Wanda into singing "You Don't Bring Me Flowers," but she did not know the words.

"Do you like Barry White?" said Mr. Pagano. "'You're the First, the Last, My Everything?'"

"THATS MY FAVORITE SONG!!!" I busted in. "YOU HAVE TO SING THAT!!!"

And so they did! Here’s a 45-second clip:

Then Jacob returned and the two friends sang a beautiful operatic duet.

The grand finale: two Ukrainian ladies came by with their brother. It was his birthday. Could Mr. Pagano sing "Happy Birthday"?

The speaker was out of batteries, but no matter. Mr. Pagano, Jacob, Wanda, the two sisters and I serenaded the birthday man a capella. He looked very pleased. "Thank you! Thank you!" he said.

"And the curtain has gone down," said Mr. Pagano, as the crowd wandered off.

"What a nice ending!" I said.

"Right?" said Mr. Pagano. "God is good."

Mr. Pagano packed up his gear and we sat on a bench so he could tell me the rest of his story.

He met the person he refers to as his "best friend" 21 years ago, at a Halloween party at a karaoke bar.

"I saw Bruce sitting at the bar by himself in his Wall Street clothes, his tie, his jacket," said Mr. Pagano. "Now I don't approach anyone at clubs, male, female—I'm too shy. But something made me..."

They lived together in Bruce's Bay Ridge co-op for 18 years. "He was a big supporter of me singing,” said Mr. Pagano. “He was a lot of fun. He had the best sense of humor. He worked for Wall Street, but he wanted to be an actor, and he sang also."

They sang karaoke together at the local bars. And then Mr. Pagano decided to "take it up a notch," as he put it.

His first plaza performance was in 2019. He dressed in a top hat and tails. Bruce carried his equipment.

"Do you remember what prompted you to go the very first time?" I asked.

"Yeah, my spirit," said Mr. Pagano. "I said, 'You know, I'm not fully living because I'm not doing what I want to do.' I wanted to be a little more professional and venture out. So this is the way I thought I could do it. And it works, kind of."

"What do you mean by 'kind of’?” I asked. "What would it mean for it to 'work'?"

"I would be a well-known singer," said Mr. Pagano. "I would make my living off singing. But I sometimes think, 'Would I be able to handle that life?' You know, maybe God gave me no more than I can handle. So I humble myself."

"If people hadn't responded favorably, I wouldn't be doing this," he added. "But I was surprised. I've met all kinds of people."

Parents film their kids singing songs they ask to perform on the plaza, and elderly couples slow dance together, he said. The old ladies in the hood come by and sway to "Those Were the Days." Folks sing Broadway tunes while their friends cheer them on. He's led impromptu Samba and disco dance parties. And while he's not in it for the cash, he once had a lady tip him $30 to perform an afternoon of Sinatra tunes for her 101-year-old mother.

He's refined his repertoire over the years. His favorites are "Sweet Caroline," because it’s an easy crowd pleaser, and "Everybody's Talking" because it's so lovely. The most requested tune? Sinatra’s "New York, New York".

While his favorite singers include Sinatra, Tina Turner and Elton John, he has no illusions about his own voice.

"I may be tone deaf!' he said. "But when I hear myself on a recording, I think I sound okay. Like Madonna! You know, throughout the years, I've always heard Madonna's not such a great singer, but she's a great businesswoman and performer. And that's what got me going."

"So Madonna was a great businesswoman and performer," I said. "And you are...?"

"I have the desire and, you know, the fortitude, the inner love for it!" he said.  

Mr. Pagano resumed his story. When Bruce died in 2021 of alcoholism at age 56, Mr. Pagano stopped performing for a spell. But he took voice lessons online during the pandemic and resumed his performances two years ago, always beginning the show with a recording of Bruce singing Neil Diamond's "Hello."

"I'd say, ‘This is dedicated to my best friend Bruce,’” said Mr. Pagano. "It was healing."

Mr. Pagano no longer introduceshis performances with the Bruce recording these days. He'd started his set that afternoon, for instance, with Sinatra's "My Way."

I'd missed it, and it's another of my favorite songs, so I’d asked him to sing it again, and he introduced the tune with a little stage patter.

"My way might not be the right way," he said. "But if you love something, you follow your heart. If you love something, you do it. No matter what people say!”

"And if it's good," he continued, "It makes other people happy, and it makes you happy. Am I happy? Yeah, I'm happy. Am I content? Yeah, I'm content. I am. I've had a lot of fun times here. And more fun times to go. So, Mr. Frank Sinatra's in the house! Here we go!"

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