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By Colin Mixson
Brooklyn Daily
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Talk about police brass!
The New York Police Department’s jazz band played Katy Perry — and some bygone big-band classics — for kids at Marine Park’s PS 207 on Jan. 11. The show really got students jazzed up, one educator said.
“It was fantastic,” said PS 207 assistant principal Noreen Alvarez. “The kids were talking about it all day. They had the teachers and the students up and dancing.”
The ensemble is composed of officers from all over the city who aspire to both social and musical harmony, a top department official said.
“These are all officers who have musical talent and, on special occasions, they’ll take off their gun belt and take up their trumpet,” said transit division chief Joseph Fox.
The band, which featured 19 police performers and a few cats from PS 207’s middle-school jazz band, began with classics from the blues and jazz canon before moving on to contemporary pop selections such as Katy Perry’s “Roar,” Alvarez said.
Police explained each genre’s nuances to the rapt audience of 7–10-year-olds, another officer said.
“We do a whole intro of blues, jazz, and pop, so they hear the different sounds, and we explain to them the different styles of music,” said Lieutenant Tony Giorgio, who put the band back together in 1991 after a hiatus.
For a grand finale, the school’s staff arrayed themselves and performed the classic Rockettes-style kick-line while the band played Frank Sinatra’s “New York, New York.”
Honchos intend for the show to humanize the force, and after the concert, Fox reminded kids the police are there to back them up.
“These kids are at an age where they’re at their most impressionable,” Fox said. “I told the children that there are many lessons they’ll have today, but one lesson I’d like them to remember is that behind these uniforms are men, women, sisters, wives, and they’re putting their lives on the line to protect you and make you happy.”
