It's Sunday morning at 11 in the Bridesburg section of the city, in the local Boys and Girls club. There are about 60 people in the gym, all of them men, all of them white, aged from their teens to early eighties, lined up in rows and playing instruments. As they play, they are moving a little awkwardly, not really marching but moving in step, trying to dance but losing their concentration as they focus on the music.
The music lilts, with quick, progressing melodies and an overall dense, wonderful sound, due to the wide range of instruments. The bass and baritone saxophones, as well as four upright base fiddles, offer deep tones, while the alto and tenor saxes, as well as the banjos, violins and accordions, balance out the sound on the other side.
Seeing them play and dance for the first time, the most striking aspect is their appearances. Many of them are portly, or at least have convex bellies. They talk in gritty Philly-speak, have goatees, wear Eagles paraphernalia, or Notre Dame jerseys, or coveralls with their first names on the lapels. They look like they would fit in at a union rally, or in a sports bar. But they aren't in a sports bar. They are in a string band.
The only thing that's missing, to be added later, are the costumes, which will be unimaginably elaborate, sequined monstrosities with feathers enough to change every one of these men into a swirl of peacocks and ostriches. Sometimes the apparel weighs hundreds of pounds for each person — not to mention the instruments they'll have to carry in the blistering cold of the coming New Year's Day.
Together, they make up the Ferko String Band, one of Philadelphia's famous mummer's clubs, part of a century-old tradition. Every New Year's Day, 15,000 mummers invade Broad Street in a parade from South Philly to City Hall, some dressed meticulously as women, some wearing skirts with an unmistakable maleness, some dancing and playing music, many drinking alcohol and all sporting the shiniest, fanciest set of clothes and feathers you have ever seen. They are the mummers. Proud. Beaming. Musical. Fraternal.
But on this Sunday, the Ferko String Band has a quieter spirit. Their routine is just getting off its feet, and this is the first time they are rehearsing something besides the music. This is their first Sunday rehearsal of the year. The band is wedged into the back of the gym, and six guys in the front, who will eventually hold banjos, move forward in synch. Phil Rotundo, who is young and tall and thin and wearing a bowling shirt, leads the way to the front, where the men form three lines and strut. This is the Mummers' Strut: backs arched, taking cross-over steps forward and back, snapping in time, nodding mischievously to the music. Then they move out to the sidelines to make way for the coming band.
After about an hour or so of going over this opening segment, they break into groups to go over music, and also into committees, to plan costumes, props and additional choreography. All in all, they will put in 10 or 20 hours a week for the next two months, not to mention the Tuesday music rehearsals throughout the year — all for a four-and-a-half minute extravaganza that will cost upwards of $80,000.
The reason they put in so much time, the momentum behind the mummers' parade, is the ferocity of the competition. Eighteen other string bands are vying for a first place finish, and all are packing their hours of practice and tens of thousands of dollars into a routine just a few minutes long. In addition to the string bands, there are three other divisions of mummers that compete: fancy clubs, fancy brigades and comic clubs. The fancy clubs and fancy brigades have floats as well as the elaborate costumes of the string bands, but they play recordings or hire musicians instead of playing their own music. The comics come out dressed impishly in skirts, holding a parasol in one hand and some kind of alcohol in another. This group, more than the others, gives mummery much of its raucous reputation. The Ferko String Band, however, doesn't allow its members to drink before or during performances. If anyone does, they are summarily kicked out. They consider themselves the gentlemen of mummery.
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Over time, the parade — which mummers affectionately call the mistress — has gotten louder, longer, bigger and more ostentatious. The sets are getting closer to a mix of Broadway spectacle and Las Vegas glitz. Each year's performance one-ups the previous.
This has been the pattern since the parade began in 1901. But before that, long before, mummery was just a neighborhood ritual. The Swedes in the 1600s, who lived on Tinicum Island in the Delaware River, would visit their neighbors on the second day of Christmas and pound pots to scare away the devils. In the 1700s, the men — at that time mostly British — began to dress up in costumes for neighbors to guess their identities; many dressed as women, others sooted their faces. In the 1800s, Irishmen from South Philly began to march to City Hall on New Year's, celebrating with kettles, pot lids, cowbells, speaking trumpets, conch shells and, most notably, guns. For this reason, the mummers are also nicknamed shooters. Italians added a flair for costumes and music, and by the mid-1800s, local parades were happening all around Philadelphia, and the city was doing anything it could to prevent them. By 1901, city officials gave in and organized the parade themselves, eliminating the shooting for good.
Phil Rotundo, Ferko's captain, traces mummery back to Momus, the Greek god of mimicry. Hence, the name mummers. Then, to Shakespearean plays and the burlesque movement. Hence, the wearing of women's clothing. From there, Rotundo says, the practice made its way into South Philadelphia, which paved the way for the ethnic diversity that mummer clubs would have — if not across racial lines initially, at least across ethnic ones.
"We have people from every nationality," he says. "Italian. Jewish. Irish. Polish. And we have everything from short-order cooks to doctors, policemen, professors, firemen, advertising, sales. I'm an advertising sales rep." There are no women in the group, though, Rotundo says; none have ever applied.
However, racial minorities have yet to find their place in the mix of most mummers' groups. Earlier this year, a documentary, named Strut! after the mummers' famous step, at least partly dealt with how black people have fit into and out of mummery through the years. Early in its history, since the mumming parades began in 1901, the music borrowed greatly from minstrelsy, and some black men as late as 1919 were recorded as taking part in the march. Because of this, and because of the soot-faced Englishmen that once went door-to-door in costume, many of the mummers did the parade in blackface. By 1964, a black attorney lobbied for the city to outlaw the practice, which was eventually banned from the parade. Now, a number of black men participate in mummery as hired bands to the fancy clubs and brigades. The majority of mummers, though, are white.
One of the black men featured in Strut! said that a lot of black people don't want to join a fraternal organization so tightly knit with family members and lifelong friends. Perhaps mummer clubs are not fully integrated because of a tradition that their families were a part of and others' were not.
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Rotundo, like nearly all other mummers, came to the tradition because of his father. Like most mummers, he learned to play his instrument of choice, the saxophone, from his dad, and furthered his abilities on his own. Very few mummers have been formally trained.
As the band's captain, he's basically the frontman for Ferko throughout the year. Other than that, the heft of the work is up to the committees, of which there are three: music, drill and costume.
The three work together to pick a theme, usually with the music already in mind, and then the committees separate, each working with hired professionals to synthesize the theme and their ideas with professional feasibility. This year's theme is confidential, for competitive reasons, of course. Last year, they were planning on an Egyptian theme until Sept. 11, after which they switched to a less controversial cowboy routine and lost the competition.
Starting in October, Ferko brings all these elements together to prepare for the parade. They are something of a legacy in mummery, having won more than any other band: 20 times. This is why much of the time everyone talks about beating Quaker City, the band that has won for the last four years in a row. For this, they are all pushing themselves a little extra.
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Usually, after rehearsals are through, at around 1 p.m., most of the guys trickle into the Joseph A. Ferko string band clubhouse, a few blocks from the Boys and Girls club, to watch football. They are crazy for the Eagles. This week, the Eagles don't play on Sunday, though — they play on Monday night.
About 15 guys showed up Monday, though Sunday's games often fill the entire room. The Eagles were playing the New York Giants, one of their major rivals. As you walk into the clubhouse, there is a sign above the stairs leading up to the main room. It reads: "No admittance except to those men totally committed to winning."
The room is fairly expansive, about 70 or 80 feet by 30 feet, with high ceilings. It is decorated with plaques and photographs of past years, almost always taken in full garb on Broad Street in front of City Hall. The floor is lined with velvet carpet, and toward the right of the room, chairs are stacked next to about 15 music stands, which are used for Tuesday night practices.This Monday, though, they aren't really talking music, or mummery, or anything, really, except football. They all have their Eagles green on in some place or another: sweatshirts, hats, jerseys.
After a commercial, ABC producers run a quick shot of the Liberty Bell before a play begins. "Here they go again with the Liberty Bell," shouts Steve Bujnowski. "Every damn time they have to show the bell. All right, now give us the cheesesteak."
People all around have joined Bujnowski in making fun of the Bell, but he is the most vehement, and the loudest. "Why the hell do they always show that bell?" he asks. "It cracked anyway. It wasn't even a good bell."
From behind, Joe McGee, a police officer, says, "That's because they didn't have union labor." Then Joe Giardino, known as Joe G., asks everyone who it was that made the Liberty Bell. No one knows. He smiles: "Pass and Stowe." Everyone agrees. They knew that.
The food comes a few minutes later — three large pizzas, three or four cheesesteaks with pepperoni, and wings, lots of wings.
One phrase that everybody repeats, over and over, like a byword, is "$12 million." They are talking about Eagles quarterback Donovan McNabb's contract, about how much money he is making this year. Bujnowski thinks he shouldn't run as much as he does, that he should throw the ball a little more.
During another commercial — for in between them the only speech is in praise or in denigration of the game — they begin talking about the snipers, about how they were apprehended. "You know who got those two guys, don't you?" Giardino asks.
McGee answers, "Two street cops."
There are other cases when this has happened, too, and they begin going over them, particularly that of serial killer Ted Bundy. Away from them, by the food, Bujnowski is talking about mummery, about Ferko.
"Sunday, that's just one day. This," he points at the guys watching the game, "this is what makes it so great. I've been in a string band 25 years. I've been in Ferko 15 years. It's a great group of guys." He plays the baritone sax, but in past years he has played banjo and bass fiddle. Like others, he learned from someone in a string band.
Bujnowski is interrupted by a number of jeers at a massive defensive lineman on the New York Giants. Apparently, he was out of the game a few plays because he injured his big toe.
Bujnowski moved back up to the bar. "Big toe? Big toe? Six million dollars a year and you hurt your big toe?" The tape cut to a profile of the man smiling, and between his front teeth there was a space of air about a half-inch wide. Jason Nestor, who is 30, works in Penn's facilities department, and plays the baritone sax, says, "It looks like they don't have a very good dental plan over there in New York."
Other topics discussed that night during commercials include: their appreciation of the movie Monsters, Inc., as well as Shrek and other Pixar films; the unfairness with which Mike Piazza, the catcher for the New York Mets, is treated because of his flamboyance; the bluntness of Maryland Police Chief Charles Moose; the awfulness of the game.
The oldest one there is named Bud Strickler, who has been in Ferko for 49 years, since junior high, and has always been known as the prankster of the band. Next year, he will get a watch to commemorate his 50th year as a mummer. He used to be a police officer, and is retired now and tends the bar in the clubhouse. Strolling around the room, he points at all the pictures and explains the themes and whether they won or lost, and why. Looking at one picture, from 1962, he points out a man that was right next to him in the front of the parade, and collapsed as he was walking in costume. A few minutes later, after the band rounded the corner, he found out the man had died in the hospital. He nodded solemnly, looking blankly into the photograph. It was a good way to go.
