It was the late summer of 1976 when our friend Jean Marc (Gargiulo) called Carlo (Stevan) to inform him that on November 13th, Harry Belafonte would perform his first of four shows at the Theatre des Champs Elysées, Paris (France).

Carlo made a quick phone call to me and our common friend Nuccio (Isaia), all deep admirers of Harry. We three happily cheered and requested Jean Marc to immediately purchase the tickets, first row, central seats! … We really wanted to make sure we could see Harry Belafonte from a very close position. 

Those two months before our travel to Paris passed with us three meeting often, imagining if he would do a show similar to the one recorded at Carnegie Hall. Obviously, it should have been different, too many years had passed since then. But we spent our time listening to the excitement of his “Live” recordings we had: Carnegie Hall – Returns to Carnegie Hall – Greek Theatre – Belafonte Live in Toronto – Live in Tokyo.

When the time to travel arrived, we caught the night train from Torino to Paris, and arrived at the “Gare de Lyon” the next morning at 7 a.m. – There we met Jean Marc, and during that day we convinced him to get his own ticket for the evening show. Jean Marc was not a Belafonte fan and decided to buy the cheapest ticket he could, up in the balcony and really far from the stage. (For completion information’s sake, Jean Marc was and still is the President of the “Elvis Presley Fan Club of France”, the “Treat Me Nice” fan club).

Harry was performing two shows a day, one in the afternoon and another starting 8 p.m. – We had our tickets for the 8 pm show (first row – central seats confirmed!). 

Finally we were inside the Theatre sitting with our arms touching the stage, and when the music started, the curtain lifted and Harry Belafonte appeared, walking across the stage, smiling. He was wearing a white shirt with ample sleeves, and a long dark vest and trousers. He made a bow and jumped right intro “Pastures of Plenty,” resonating loud and clear! That was followed by the wonderful “Streets of London”. From that very moment I was sinking deep into Mr. Belafonte’s music world! It was a 20 year-long dream materialized to see Mr. Belafonte in front of us. Naturally his program included his old standards, but also some new numbers (i.e. “How Long Have You Been Blind?”, “New York Taxi”, and many others). 

The show was in two parts, about one and a half hours each! Before the end of the first he also introduced Ms Rhetta Hughes who sang “Loving Arms” (which we knew well from Elvis’ version released only one year before). 

During the whole show the three of us had been happily singing along, applauding, stomping our feet, shouting with joy like kids -and I was loudly whistling (at that time I could really whistle very loud!). Harry more than once looked at us with an amused smile! Meanwhile Jean Marc slowly worked his way down to an empty seat only a few rows behind us. 

Incredibly those three hours felt like they lasted only a few minutes… at least that was our sensation! 

Before the curtain closed, Harry came close to the stage edge to shake hands. When he was shaking ours, I asked him to autograph the program’s booklet of that show, and suddenly he replied, “Why don’t you come to meet me backstage”? … We were astonished and as the curtain closed, there were three Italians jumping on the stage and trying to walk across it to get to the backstage!! Yes we really did that! Naturally we were stopped by Security and when we claimed that “Mr. Belafonte asked us to meet him backstage”!!! they showed us which way to properly reach it. 
 
We crossed the closed doors leading to the back and realized that some other people were there, waiting for Mr. Belafonte. We decided to stay a bit far from the group waiting for Harry to remain only with us. We succeeded.  

The desired time to get close to him and meet him was there. 

Those photos are the witness of our first encounter and, it goes without saying, I still have them.

~ Tiziano, Italy, 2025


Editor’s note: Carlo Steven, Tiziano’s friend, was very much of the glue that held our little group of Mr. B. admirers together. He was a great collector, full of life and kindness. We lost him shortly after Harry died in 2023.