67-year-old Rockville Centre church singer dreams of reaching the big stage

“This would be a perfect song for Tony Bennett,” said Rockville Centre’s Frank Scafuri, who recently recorded his original tune, “A Small Town Christmas,” with world-renowned jazz guitarist John Pizzarelli after winning a bid for charity.

Scafuri, 67, a professional singer for the last 50 years, wrote the song in 1973 during his last year at the Juilliard School in Manhattan. When he learned of the opportunity for a one-hour recording session with Pizzarelli before the guitarist’s Feb. 17 concert at Molloy College, he jumped at the opportunity, bidding $350 as part of a fundraiser to benefit families in Uganda. He won the bid, dug up the song and prepared to play it with the music icon.

“I didn’t know him, but we hugged each other,” said Scafuri, recalling the moment he met Pizzarelli. “He was as pleasant as a man could be.”

Scafuri grew up in Lynbrook, where he sang in the middle school’s barbershop quartet and the high school’s varsity chorus. At 17, he was pumping gas at a local gas station when a music director he knew asked if he could sing at a wedding that weekend at Lynbrook’s St. James Church.

“He said it pays $15. I said 15? Yeah!” Scafuri recalled, his face illuminating. “$15 and here I am pumping gas. I’ve got to change my career.”

Scafuri took a job at the United Church of Rockville Centre in 1970 as a tenor soloist, spending about 10 years there. He later worked at Our Lady of Peace in Lynbrook for 12 years as well as St. Rocco’s Church in Glen Cove for 13 years, where he built the music program as its director. He has also served as the music director at Rockville Centre’s Sandel Senior Center, where he conducts a chorus of 37 seniors that perform two concerts a year.

Over the last six years, he has substituted as a singer and organist at a bunch of different churches. “I’m constantly busy, but my dream?” he said. “I want to be out there on the stage.

“I tell my students there’s a seed planted inside of you,” Scafuri continued, “and you can’t stop that seed from growing until you’re no longer on Earth.”

He thinks his Christmas song, which was inspired by the peaceful vibe of the holiday season in Windham, N.Y., could be the key to that dream. “We hear the same Christmas songs over and over, and they’re fun at first, and then they get tiring,” Scafuri said. “How many time can you hear ‘chestnuts roasting on an open fire?”

Scafuri posted the recording of “A Small Town Christmas” on his YouTube channel last month.

“I want to be out there in public,” he added. “I want to record songs. That’s why this Christmas song means so much to me, because I think this could be possibly a ticket. If it’s not me, maybe somebody will sing my song.”

His childhood friend, Tom Interligi, recalled Frank performing shows at Lynbrook High School, during which he would do impressions of singers, including Dean Martin. The two have recorded music at Interligi’s house over the years, and Scafuri’s determination to get in front of a larger audience at his age is admirable, he said.

“I don’t have that drive that he has,” Interligi said. “…I look at him in awe.”

Scafuri said he went through four auditions for television music competition, “the X Factor,” about a decade ago, and plans to audition for “America’s Got Talent” this spring. He also said he would be recording Kurt Kaiser’s “Pass it On” at Dream Recording Studios in Bellmore, and will disseminate it to churches around the country to get his name out there.

“He’s an entertainer at heart, and I know that if he can get up on stage in front of 10 people or 1,000 people, he would still give the same show,” Interligi said. “He’s like that. That’s Frank.”