Remembering Philly's 'Geater' Jerry Blavat

Blavat, Dionne Warwick, FMQB's late Kal Rudman

Jerry Blavat, the fast-talking Philadelphia DJ and impresario known as “The Geator with the Heater,” died Friday morning at 82. His tireless promotion of pioneering Black artists of the 1950s and 1960s shaped the pop music culture of the city where he maintained an iconic presence for seven decades.

According to Don DeLuca at The Philadelphia Inquirer, Blavat first came to fame as a dancer on the teen-targeted pop music television show Bandstand in the 1950s. Having learned to jitterbug watching his mother, aunts, and uncles dance to Artie Shaw and Tommy Dorsey records — ”The Italians, when the radio was on, they would start to dance,” he said — he quickly established himself as one of the stars of the show, then hosted by Bob Horn.

Having heard Fats Domino’s “Ain’t That a Shame” and Little Richard’s “Tutti Frutti” — played by Black DJs like Jocko Henderson and George Woods on Philadelphia station WDAS — he advised Horn to play the originals, rather than the watered down versions sung by the likes of Pat Boone.

Little Richard later said of Blavat: “For a white boy, the Geator’s got too much soul. And can that boy dance! I remember doing his TV show and he jumps on the piano and starts to do The Slop. … There’s only one Geator.”

He went on to make his mark as a band manager, record store and club owner, TV host, concert promoter, DJ, friend to the famous, and a living, breathing, irreplaceable repository of Philadelphia music history.

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Blavat’s death was caused by on Friday morning myasthenia gravis, an autoimmune neuromuscular disease, and other health problems.

A family statement issued on Friday said: “Jerry proudly said, ‘Life is precious, and I am happy. And when I am happy, I want the world to be happy.’ ... His love for Philadelphia only superseded his love of music. He was proud of this great city, and nothing made him prouder than the impact the music from Philadelphia made on the world.”

Artists like Dionne Warwick and Aretha Franklin benefitted from his early support and remained loyal to him through the decades. He became friends with Sammy Davis Jr. in the 1950s and was best man at his wedding in 1970.

Blavat’s memoir You Only Rock Once — whose title was shortened from one of his favorite sayings: “Keep on rockin’, because you only rock once!” — was published in 2011. Motown founder Berry Gordy then wrote of Mr. Blavat: “For all the artists, and all the others in the music business, you have been so important to all of us through the years.”

The Queen of Soul put it more succinctly: “I love the Geator!”

In the late 1950s, Blavat worked as road manager for the Philadelphia doo-wop group Danny & the Juniors, whose big hit was “At the Hop.” When he got off the road and returned to South Philly, he used $120 that he won in a dice game to buy time on Camden radio station WCAM-AM.

He then sold the time to advertisers to make a profit, which allowed him to use the airtime any way he liked, freeing him from the constraints of program directors.

Blavat was involved in many aspects of the music business in Philadelphia. In the 1960s he was a partner in the Lost Nite and Crimson Record labels, and co-owned the local chain the Record Museum. From 1965 to 1967, after Dick Clark and Bandstand left for Los Angeles, he hosted a teen-targeted Philadelphia music show called The Discophonic Scene.