Integral in caring and advocating for the inmates were two Catholic chaplains, Father Carl J. Breitfeller and Father Donald Sheehy. As Dominican priests, both men had taken vows of poverty and committed their lives to meeting the needs for the inmates, whether that meant taking law classes or learning about jazz music. In 1955, Father Brietfeller got a request from the inmates to visit jazz singer Sarah Vaughn during her Washington tour and ask for photos and autographs to bring back to the prison. Much to everyone’s surprise, Sarah Vaughn not only agreed to sign the pictures, but decided to visit the Reformatory with her band and play a free concert for the prisoners.[3] Inspired by the inmates’ joyful response after the performance, the Catholic chaplains decided to produce and direct another jazz show.
As Father Breitfeller recalled a few years later, putting on jazz concerts didn’t come naturally at first, but he was a quick study. “I didn't know a thing about jazz then. But I got interested because a lot of my boys were interested, and out of that grew our summer festival.”[4] That summer festival became an annual event known as the Lorton Jazz Festival, which attracted some of the jazz world’s biggest stars for an exclusive show before an audience of inmates.
Each year, months before the event, the inmates prepared for the festival by building a makeshift stage on the athletic fields and organizing the dugout to serve as a dressing room and storage area for musical equipment. As one inmate put it, “The day one festival is over we start thinking about the next. Ninety per cent of us are jazz fans and this is the biggest day of the year for us.”[5]
Meanwhile, the chaplains enticed local radio hosts like WMAL’s Felix Grant to emcee the event, and began the process of booking musicians.[6] Far from the organs and choirs of the churches he was used to frequenting, Father Breitfeller spent his nights pub crawling in an effort to line-up acts for the Festival. He described his process to reporters saying, “I’ve visited as many as three nightclubs in an evening. I go in, get to talking to the musicians, so they know me, and then when I need them they know what I want and are willing to help.”[7]