Longtime performer Lou Del Bianco brought song, storytelling and a deep sense of gratitude to the Island Park Public Library on Nov. 6, presenting two Thanksgiving-themed programs that bridge cultures, generations and history.
Del Bianco, who has been performing these shows since 2002, opened with a children’s program focused on what the Pilgrims and Native Americans understood about thankfulness. Through songs, legends and audience participation, he guided young attendees in exploring the holiday’s themes.
The origins of these Thanksgiving shows, however, were personal for Del Bianco. Soon after the death of his mother, Del Bianco was approached with the idea of a Thanksgiving show for children.
“I started thinking about the gratitude that I felt for having [my mother] in my life, for having raised me, for her being an incredible mom,” he said. “And that is what Thanksgiving is all about, the gratitude.”
Del Bianco has worked with young audiences for about 40 years, including through one-man shows. He said keeping children engaged during performances requires creating a fully interactive environment. Throughout the performance, he brings children onstage to act out Native American legends and Pilgrim or colonial songs.
“The hallmark of how I keep children during the stories is that I make it experiential for them,” Del Bianco said. “When children see their peers helping to bring a story alive, it draws the audience in right away and makes it more interesting for them.”
To maintain the flow of the show, Del Bianco created a series of hand signals that cue transitions between songs and stories — a technique refined over decades of working with young audiences.
“You have one activity with a child, and then when they’re done with that activity, there’s that gray area of time where you better get their attention back or else you’re going to lose them,” he said.
Del Bianco ends the children’s program by pairing a Pilgrim hymn with Native American sign language, a symbolic gesture meant to unite the two cultures through shared experience.
The evening program shifted to adult audiences, where Del Bianco explored his grandfather Luigi Del Bianco’s overlooked contributions as a chief carver on Mount Rushmore. The show grew out of a family discovery years ago, when Del Bianco’s uncle read a book on the monument’s construction and found no mention of Luigi — despite his key role.
“It was a really terrible error of omission,” Del Bianco said. The family had uncovered primary source documents at the Library of Congress that confirmed his grandfather’s importance to the monument’s design, but Mount Rushmore officials rejected those findings.
Motivated to set the record straight, Del Bianco created a one-man show sharing the story of his grandfather’s artistry and persistence. The program has become a tribute not just to his family, but also to the craft and legacy of storytelling itself.
“What I do is not passive,” Del Bianco said. “It is all very engaging, physically, vocally.”
For him, storytelling remains a vital cultural thread.
“Storytelling is an art form that helps people of all ages to experience and express their humanity,” Del Bianco said. “I think we, as a culture, are lost if we’re not able to express our humanity through stories, through songs and dance of all the ancient people. They expressed their humanity this way, and it’s a reminder that we are all human and we are all connected.”
