When Dennis Day was growing up in East Chicago, Indiana, he fully expected to work in a steel mill after high school. Music may have been his birthright but being practical, he thought it had to remain a sideline. “I always sang,” says the tall, handsome tenor. “My family has been blessed with the gift of music.” His mother, Irene Day, was a well-known concert singer and his sister is classically trained. Over the years, Day has made sure music wouldn’t remain a sideline. Teaching and counseling may have occupied his days but singing filled his nights. Jazz aficionados in Chicago, Washington DC, and New York have become as familiar with his sweet voice as the East Chicago churchgoers of his boyhood.

Never one to do things half-heartedly, Day spent most of his free time in his teens singing with various neighborhood groups, many of which were the first to be integrated. His stages were local street corners and churches. At 15 he formed The Valients. This was the early ‘60’s, a hot time for music in East Chicago. Day’s group shared managers and rehearsal space with the legendary Dells and were often featured on shows with nearby rivals. The Jackson Five and the Valiants became the first vocal groups to sign on with the Gary, Indiana-based label Steeltown Records, hoping to challenge Motown’s domination of the airwaves.

According to Steeltown President and co-founder, Gordon Keith, The Valients recorded several songs on the fledgling label written by Day. “So in Love” and “I Shed a Tear” received the widest acclaim. “The Jackson Five moved on to Motown Records and, as they say, the rest is history,” says Keith, who is now a counselor and minister in Gary. “Dennis decided to leave the area also to pursue his education. It was another big loss to us at Steeltown Records.”

Recalling those early years, being mentored by Rock and Roll Hall of Famers The Dells, Day says, “I learned a great deal from The Dells about harmony, vocal affect, and control. Marvin Jr., their lead, would tease me about singing too pretty, saying I needed ‘a little gravel in my growl.’ That was never my style. He was only pointing out the range of emotions that all good singers use in delivering a song. I never forgot that."

Day also counts among his early influences James Pookie Hudson and The Spaniels, local favorites who made the big time with one of the all-time classic hits, “Goodnight, Sweetheart, It’s Time to Go.”Nat King Cole, Ella Fitzgerald, and Gospel greats the Roberta Martin Singers helped to influence Day’s vocal style.

After graduation from Roosevelt High School, Day did work in a steel mill, but only long enough to save enough money to go to Fisk University, an historically Black institution in Nashville. “One thing that drew me to Fisk was the incredible music of the Fisk Jubilee Singers and the Nashville music tradition,” explains Day.

In Nashville, Day formed a new group, Dino and the Dynamics (later named The Jades), for whom he was lead singer. They played to capacity audiences in clubs catering to his unique brand of “Chicago Smooth” and “Southern Soul” rock and roll. Their first recording, “My Loss Your Gain,” a ballad on the Decca label, made Billboard’s Top 40 in R&B. Day also became a regular demo artist for Columbia Screen Gems on famed Music Row. Music flowed then in Nashville with Little Richard, Jackie Wilson, and Jimi Hendrix as club regulars.

Day has always kept one foot in church music and the other in pop and jazz. While at Fisk, he continued the tradition. The Fisk University Choir naturally attracted him. A highlight of his career with them was singing a tenor duet, with Eugene Ormandy conducting. “Imagine me,” says Day, “a doo-wah street corner singer, fresh out of my sooty steel-toed metatarsal shoes and doing those one-nighters in Gary and Chicago, taking my cue from the Philadelphia Symphony’s celebrated maestro. It was incredible.”

 After graduating from Fisk with a degree in sociology, Day worked in human services, and as a staffer for the House Speaker in the Illinois General Assembly. In 1970 a Ford Foundation fellowship enabled him to earn his masters degree in Adult Continuing Education from the University of Chicago.  The father of two daughters and divorced, he moved to Washington DC in 1981, a year that marked his return to music. Day joined the DC-based Blackbyrds, a jazz/fusion group formed by Howard University’s resident jazz professor, trumpeter Dr. Donald Byrd.  The group had six gold albums and a Grammy nomination for “Walkin’ in Rhythm” to its credit. It was during this period that Day had the honor of singing a solo at the wake held for the great fighter Joe Louis at Washington’s Nineteenth Street Baptist Church. After a string of featured appearances with The Blackbyrds, Day formed his own group and began playing DC’s club circuit.