New York, NY, Sept. 03, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Pitta & Baione LLP is the official law firm sponsor of the 100th Feast of San Gennaro,  as well as the Grand Street stage at the feast, running September 17–27, 2026 in Manhattan’s Little Italy. 

Founded in 1926 and organized ever since by Figli di San Gennaro, the Feast reaches its centennial this year with an expanded eleven-day music program on the Grand Street stage, shaped with Keep Good Company and Red Sauce Studio, including Italian American standards, opera, jazz, indie, and performers traveling from Italy. The Feast is free and open to all, on Mulberry Street between Canal and Houston, with additional programming on Hester and Grand. On Friday, September 25, 2026, the NYPD Jazz Band will back Sal “The Voice” Valentinetti in a set including a dedicated tribute marking 25 years since September 11th as well as Dominic Chianese and Ginger Winn.

As part and parcel of its sponsorship activities, Pitta & Baione LLP is helping neighborhood restaurants secure permits and coordinate final details and working on the curation of the Grand Street stage. Valentinetti’s September 25 set also pays tribute to Julius La Rosa, who was scheduled to perform at the Feast that was canceled by the attacks. Chianese, “Uncle Junior” of The Sopranos, is a longtime friend of partner Vincent F. Pitta; Ginger Winn, who scored 8:48, is a close friend of partner Matthew Baione and his wife, Tina.

“My maternal uncle Philly (“Philageel”) Scala in the mid-1950s was a member of the winning 5-person “heavy on the bottom, light on top” team that competed in climbing the greased pole at the Feast, an annual event that was held on Hester Street between Mulberry and Baxter Streets. The event was banned by New York City in the 1980s. At the top of the grease pole was the bounty–salami, provolone, and envelopes filled with cash. Johnny Mathis, who at the time was a young and upcoming singer, was walking through the feast and happened upon the presentation of the winner’s trophy, sponsored either by the Piels Brothers or by the Pabst Blue Ribbon Beer Company, and which gave yearly bragging rights to the event winners. After the trophy presentation event, my uncle, who had matinee idol good looks, invited Johnny Mathis up the street to my grandmother’s 2nd floor apartment at 178 Mulberry Street (next door to “Tony Cigar’s”  Mare Chiaro Bar), for a plate of spaghetti with white clam sauce,” says Pitta & Baione LLP Partner Vincent Pitta. “I couldn’t make that story up if I tried. A hundred years on, the Feast is still located on the same street of dreams, rekindling cherished memories, like mine and my family’s”.

THE NEIGHBORHOOD IS INSIDE THE EXPOSURE ZONE

Pitta & Baione LLP was founded in 2016 to represent responders and survivors of the September 11th attacks before the World Trade Center Health Program and the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund. A decade on, most of the firm’s work involves people whose illnesses did not surface until years or decades after the dust settled, and a substantial share of them are not first responders, but the residents, office workers, students, and business owners who were simply in Lower Manhattan on that fateful day.

Little Italy is one of those places. The World Trade Center Health Program’s survivor eligibility area extends north to Houston Street, which places the entire Feast footprint inside it. Anyone who lived, worked, attended school, or ran a business in that area between September 11, 2001 and July 31, 2002 may qualify for federally funded medical monitoring and treatment, regardless of whether they have yet become ill.

“Twenty-five years later, some still do not know they may be eligible for medical care and compensation. This stage gives us a place to remember how New Yorkers found and fought their way through those long and trying months: neighbors feeding strangers, music bringing people together, and communities from as far away as Hawaii, California, Washington State, and Alaska refusing to abandon their fellow Americans in New York, Pennsylvania, and our nation’s capital. If it helps just one more person learn that health care and financial support is available to them, it is worth the effort.  And we should never, ever underestimate the simple but powerful healing power of music, which in and of itself is a meaningful exercise.”

ABOUT PITTA & BAIONE LLP

Pitta & Baione LLP represents first and secondary responders,  survivors, and family members and beneficiaries of victims of the September 11, 2001 attacks in claims before the World Trade Center Health Program and the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund.

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