"I’ve been an ardent fan of the big bands all my life. As a child growing up in New Jersey, I set my radio dial to WNEW, where "Make Believe Ballroom" featured a constant stream of recordings by big bands and their vocalists. Swing music went into hibernation for a while, as vocalists like Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, Rosemary Clooney, and Perry Como stole the spotlight away. Determined to keep the old sound alive, I accumulated a collection of over 9,000 recordings. With such a rich resource at my fingertips, it was a natural next step to inaugurate a weekly radio program, which went on the air in 1983 and is now carried by over 40 National Public Radio stations."