With so many fine trombonists having been a part of the Boston scene—I came up with a list of 27 with reputations extending well beyond the city limits just for the 25-year span of The Boston Jazz Chronicles—it is no surprise I overlooked a few who should have been mentioned earlier. Gene DiStasio is one I missed, and with his prominence on the Santisi tapes, I can finally rectify that oversight.

Photo of Gene DiStasio, mid 1960s

Gene DiStasio, mid 1960s

Gene DiStasio was born and raised in Revere, Mass, one of eight children, all budding musicians competing for practice time on the family piano. At 15, the trombone became his primary instrument, and in 1946 he started lessons with the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s John Coffey, a legendary teacher of brass players. After a few years, though, a lung ailment forced him to set aside the trombone, and he turned toward a different career path, entering Tufts University to study biochemistry. He graduated in 1953 and went on to study dentistry at NYU.

Of course, that wasn’t the end of the trombone. By about 1952, he had regained his ability to play, and became a regular in the local clubs. Even after he moved to New York, gigs still lured him back to Boston; one notable one was playing on Serge Chaloff’s 1954 recording, The Fable of Mabel. Trumpeter Herb Pomeroy was also on that session, and when he organized his big band at the Stable the following year, he offered DiStasio a chair in the trombone section. Gene accepted—and he enjoyed it so much, he came home, transferring to the Dental School at Tufts. He graduated in 1957.

So there he was, dentist by day, musician by night, and he kept it up for years. The Stable was Jazz Central for the local musicians, and it featured a band every night—Pomeroy’s big band on Tuesdays and Thursdays, various small groups under Varty Haroutunian’s direction four nights a week, and DiStasio’s quintet on Mondays. (I’ll have more on that group, with Hal Galper and Sam Rivers, in a later post.) DiStasio had the chops to move up in the jazz world—Buddy Rich and Woody Herman tried to pry him out of Boston—but he chose to stay put. When Pomeroy broke up his band in 1962, DiStasio was still with it. Then he worked with Kai Winding’s septet, and with the Jazz Workshop’s resident group, the Herb Pomeroy Sextet, from 1963 to 1966.

Brass Menagerie and Beyond

In 1968 he organized Brass ’68, a jazz-rock powerhouse featuring three trombones, two trumpets and two electric guitars, which became a prominent group on the local scene. (The name changed to the Brass Menagerie in 1969, and I’ll have more on them in a future post as well.) DiStasio was also part of Phil Wilson’s Trombone Ensemble in the late sixties and early seventies.

Photo of Gene DiStasio and Greg Hopkins

Gene DiStasio and Greg Hopkins, mid 1980s. Photo by Nick Puopolo.

In 1978, Pomeroy formed a new big band, and DiStasio was in that one, too. When it wound down in the early 1980s, he played with just about every big band in the area—Hopkins/Naus, Kenny Hadley, Duke Belaire—and he was the first person the contractors would call when they needed a trombonist for a show band. Through all this, he was still going to the office every morning to fix teeth.

DiStasio formed his last Boston group, the Boss Bones, in the late 1980s with a four-trombone front line—Gene alongside Tony Lada, Rick Stepton and Jerry Ash.

DiStasio closed his clinic and moved to Sarasota in 1994, and freed from his day job, he immediately fell in with other transplanted northerners and commenced making music. Some of his frequent Florida bandmates included drummer Don Lamond and saxophonist Kenny Soderblom. That’s where Gene was residing at the time of his death, in May 1996.

To the music. Here’s Gene DiStasio in June 1965, leading a quartet with pianist Ray Santisi, drummer Alan Dawson and bassist Gary Peacock. Here they play the standard, “Walkin’,” and DiStasio’s long opening solo calls to mind J.J. Johnson and Frank Rosolino, both of whom Gene admired. It isn’t often we hear Gene, a section man from way back, out front in a quartet setting like this.