Meet Mitch

Who the heck is Mitch Samu?

Mitch Samu grew up on Long Island, to be specific in Suffolk County on the South Shore. Roller skated as a kid, competitive roller skater. I thought it would be interesting to tell that part of the story because it has something to do with my musical journey.

Competitive roller skater from the time I was about six years old. So I grew up listening to organ music in the roller skating rink. Yes,  organ music in the roller skating rink. Listened to that a lot. When I was about 12 years old,  my folks and I were at Bayshore Long Island at the Bayshore Mall. Now that was before malls were malls the way we know them now. This was an outdoor mall. JCPenney at one end, Sears at the other end, and then a bunch of stores in between. Open air, so it wasn’t closed, right? Well at the Bayshore Mall, I happened to be out there skating at the Bayshore roller skating  rink. There was a store called the Nelson Varon Organ Studios.

For those on Long Island, Long Islanders, you may remember that. The Nelson Varon Organ Studio. They had one of those neon kind of hand-painted signs. Eight organ lessons plus an organ delivered to your house for $25.  And my mom said, would you be interested in that? Well, I didn’t know anything about playing the organ. I had just heard the organ as a kid in the roller skating rink. So we said yes. We got on board.

They delivered an organ to my house a few weeks later, and I took eight weeks of Saturday lessons on organ in a group organ setting. My teacher, Gary Kammerer, was an incredible teacher.  And after the eight weeks, as Gary was, I’m sure, told to do, you go to the parents and say, hey,  what would you think of little Mitch taking some more lessons? He’s very talented. He did that.

My parents said, yes, we’ll do it. So I studied organ from the time I was 12 years old to the time I  was 16 years old. When I was 14 years old, I started teaching at the Nelson Varon Organ Studio.  I would go to school. My mom would drive me to Bayshore. I would put on a three-piece suit.  This is back in the 70s. And I would teach adults and kids the rest of the day organ. I did that till I was 16.

During my high school years, I played the organ for two seasons at  the Nassau Coliseum for the New York Islanders. Yes, that guy. Bump, bump, bump, bump, bump,  that was me. That’s what I did in high school. I sat way up at the top and played. Had my first church gig at 15 years old as a choir director at Westminster Presbyterian Church in West Islip, Long Island.

I went to Northwestern University and studied organ for one semester. Didn’t really enjoy that. So I stopped studying organ and started playing theater piano.Theater piano in 1979. Theater, musical theater, Godspell, Jesus Christ Superstar, that kind of thing. And I’ve never looked back since.

I’ve spent my entire career as a music director, a piano player, a keyboardist, an arranger, a composer. I have been blessed to work on shows like The Lion King, shows like Wicked, shows like Saturday Night Fever, Little Shop of Horrors on Broadway. I’ve had a beautiful career in music. 

Most of what I learned, I learned by doing it myself because all I had, I said, was four years of organ lessons. That was it. The rest I learned on my own. And I want to share that. I want to share that with people.

From the time I first started learning, about 13, 14 years old, I always felt a passion.I felt a higher calling. And I really do mean that to say, share what you’ve  learned. Because I’ve taught myself on paper, I should not be able to do the things I do.

And I  want to share them with you. I want to share all of that before I leave the big blue planet.  That was a sad way to end this little bio, wasn’t it?  Check it out. I want to help your dreams come true.