Radio: Cats’ Commercials

“Listen, all you cats and fine chicks, I want you to dig a mess of this jive. Because I want to hip you to my buddy-boy, Hollywood Al. He knows those fine hip styles you all like so much—that extra-wide knee 28, 29, 30 inches and that peg bottom way down to 14 inches—that are really a killer. . . . When you buy in Hollywood Al’s Pants Shop you are buying from a hip cat who knows what it’s all about because he’s been around plenty.”

Nightly a radio character called Symphony Sid, Your Narrator of Swing plugs the wares of half a dozen sponsors with such cryptic commercials. Lovers of swing tune in every evening on WHOM in Jersey City to listen to his After Hour Swing Session (11 p.m. to midnight, E.W.T.).

Formerly Sid conducted a radio program of recorded symphonies accompanied by cultured comments in a lush bass. Hence his name Symphony Sid. On his swing show he has added a syrupy Harlem accent. Off the air he sometimes lapses into Middle High Bronx. Lady radio listeners insist Sid’s voice has a rich, disturbing quality.

Since 90% of his listeners are Negroes, many people used to write asking whether Sid was colored. Actually he is slim, slick, pallid Sidney Torin, 33, brought up in Brooklyn’s slums. For a year Symphony Sid lived in Harlem, acquired a full knowledge of Negro speech and habits. Today he even dresses like many Negroes, wears peg trousers (modified), a flat porkpie hat with a wide brim, knee-length camel’s-hair coat, suede shoes.