Talk:Francis Grasso

{{WikiProject Biography |living=no |class=Start |musician-work-group=yes |listas=Grasso, Francis }Anyone who disputes Terry Noel's importance is slow on a mental level. Terry invented sampling which was laid out in the the published book "The Night DJ Saved My Life. He was a diva and most assuradely an asshole but Francis is of no significance to earth. Francis used his set up because Terry wasnt being paid well and stole his tools. That is a fact. Fact in point - Terry's friends on record are Jimmy Hendrix, The Beatles, Andy Warhol (read books), Lou Read and me. Francis is a grade a loser. His biggest crime was not perishing earlier. I am a descendant of Terry Noel. Ease call me if you beg to differ.}

I knew Francis Grasso[edit]

My name is Jackie Columbo and I was Francis's girlfriend from 1970 through 1972. Francis was my best friend. I met him in 1966 when I was 19 and he was 17. He approached me on Church Ave. in Brooklyn and asked me out. He lived nearby with his mother at the time. I was reaquainted with him in the summer of 1970. July to be exact in Club Haven. We bumped into each other a couple of times through the years but hadn't seen him in nearly two years when I recognized him in the club. He was the DJ. We dated off and on until July 1972. I was with Francis when there was a club named Club Francis in the Village. Francis wanted to break his contract with the hoodlum owners because of the way they were treating him and refused to work and they beat him up. They broke his nose and burned a cigarette in his face. He called me when he left the hospital and came over to my home. He was a mess mentally and physically, but Francis was a man of principal and got out of the contract. Francis prevailed and started working at the Sanctuary and I remember them filming Klute and he was in the movie but only for a few minutes. You could catch him spinning the records and dancing to the beat. Francis was as good a dancer as he was spinning the records. Francis came from a single parent up bringing. His mother Mary raised him and he hardly knew his father who he advised me lived in New Jersey. His mother worked and a woman who I believe name is Rose looked after him. She also abused him from what he told me. Francis forgave both Rose who abused him and his mother who left him in her care. I met his mother who lived on Coney Island Avenue in Brooklyn. Francis also befriended the gay guys who attended the clubs like the Haven and Sanctuary but a few robbed his home and that was shattering to his trust. Francis could have been so much, he was brillant and ahead of his time. He died recognized in death more than in life and I am proud to have been his special girl. I remember last I saw him, he lived on Emmons Ave., Sheapshead Bay, Brooklyn NY with his beloved Great Dane, Dante who he had for several years. He died far too young. He asked me to marry him back in 1971 in my elevator and I should have, we all make wrong choices. I am very proud of his legacy and proud to have been a part of his life. I remember the crowds he brought in and sorry he didn't realize his worth. He is truly remembered.

I would also like to advise the original writer of his bio that Francis was born 3/25/49 and not 1948. He also attended Erasamus Hall High School on Flatbush Ave, Brooklyn and graduated in 1966. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.186.67.162 (talk) 02:32, 11 February 2009 (UTC) Jackie Columbo —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.186.66.151 (talk) 04:29, 31 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Clarification[edit]

I notice that in Wikipedia, there are a few references to the work of DJs in night clubs that seem to imply that techniques such as slip cueing or the use of headphones somehow were invented in night clubs. There is no evidence of that. Perhaps it's hard for young people today to understand this, but in the 1950s and 1960s, a DJ was pretty much usually someone who was a radio announcer -- someone who played records on the radio. The techniques invented and used by radio DJs were adopted by DJs in night clubs -- not the other way around.

Slip cueing came about because many early turntables took a long time to reach playing speed. That is, when you hit the "start" switch, the record would make, say, a half revolution or more before coming to full speed. If you didn't cue the record properly, the beginning of the recording would be distorted in terms of pitch and tempo -- sometimes called the "wow" problem. This meant that starting a record at exactly the right moment required either slip cueing or some fancing timing on the part of the DJ. Later, many broadcast quality turntables were designed to reach operation speed in a small fraction of a revolution, so slip cueing became somewhat obsolete -- simply unneeded as a technique by broadcasters. By the time I became a radio broadcast DJ (in the early 1970s), the turntables in most radio stations were of such high quality that the beginning of the music on a standard 45 rpm record could be cued at about an inch to an inch and a half from the stylus -- and the music could be started virtually instantaneously with absolutely no "wow" problem, and therefore with no need for slip cueing or any other special procedures. Thanks to technology, I never had to use slip cueing in my years on the radio. Famspear (talk) 22:56, 12 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

PS: There were, of course, DJs in night clubs back in the 1960s, etc. Very few if any of them were considered "stars." The DJ world (for lack of a better term) back then was mainly in the world of radio broadcasting. Famspear (talk) 22:58, 12 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

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