From Orange Blossom to a Casa Loma, It Plays a Saxophone, Clarinet---Glen Gray Knoblauch

According to Glen Gray, who started out as an Orange Blossom in Michigan and came from there to be a Casa Loma in New York, it isn't fair to be asked your impressions of Harvard.

However, "Spike" Gray, as he is called, when confronted with the job of playing at the Harvard-Yale Ball at the Copley Friday night, and a CRIMSON interviewer, didn't mind the unfairness of it all, but merely remarked that he was a college man, very used to it all, and fond of the Hub (but not over fond), comparing the district to a spring tonic (at any time of year.)

He's been through a long trek in the band business. According to his calculations, he was sucking a sax at the tender age of eleven, advancing from there to a clarinet, and finishing up on a flute in balmier days.

As a band leader, his first experience came at 17, when he organized his own small outfit in Illinois. Later on he got mixed up with a bunch of maestros in Detroit, Michigan, who played under the name of "Orange Blossoms."

On one journey, this outfit played at the Casa Loma Castle in Toronto, Canada. Here they picked up their name, lost their job, and went onto the road again.

At this time the band was incorporated, Gray was elected president, and a cooperative venture was on. The idea was a good one, profits being shared equally, fines being imposed for tardiness at rehearsal, drunkenness, when on the job.

From there the outfit went to Glen Island, the Essex House, and the Camel Caravan in the ether. Success has been meteoric since then.

"As a sidelight," Glen Gray remarked, "it may interest you to know that my real family name is Glen Gray Knoblauch. We decided to drop the last for commercial reasons, but the boys helped out my ego by adding a Spike."

Pee Wee Hunt and Kenny Sargent are scheduled to be on the bandstand Friday night, along with their famous chief, warbling syncopations.