Striking the Right Notes

For bandleaders, society can be a cruel mistress. At debutante parties they receive compliments but not calling cards, at charity balls they take their breaks with their players instead of their patrons, and at cocktail parties they are not to be seen at all. Even hair dressers fare better -- no doubt because they know more secrets. But with Band leader Peter Duchin, 28-year-old son of famed Piano Stylist Eddy Duchin, life is considerably sweeter.

Last month, at the White House par ty for Princess Margaret, Duchin sat at Lynda Bird's table until he had finished off his praline glace, then took his seat at the keyboard and kept Washington's ringleaders in step till 2 a.m.

At one point, the President of the U.S.

danced by. Peter waved casually. And why not? The President's partner was Duchin's wife Cheray (nee Zauderer), who is the daughter of a wealthy New York investor.

Watched Man. Virtually every night when he is not nodding his head in time to his own music, Peter is shaking his head at hors d'oeuvres trays in Manhattan drawing rooms. He is the only bandleader who is invited for supper even when he is not asked to play for it.

Gossip columnists chronicle his every move as if he were the best addition to society since Serge Obolensky.

The key to Duchin's double life lies in a scrambled lineage that is the epito me of today's mobile society. Father Eddy Duchin was only the son of a pharmacist, and a paid performer at deb parties, until he caught the eye of Marjorie Oelrichs, descendant of a leading Newport family and heiress to the last scraps of a once immense mining fortune. When she married him, the Social Register struck her name from its rolls.

But many friends could not have cared less, including Marie Norton, who became a chum when they were at Spence School together and had subsequently married Averell Harriman.

When Marjorie died six days after Peter's birth, it was the Harrimans who took care of the baby while the disconsolate Eddy went on extended concert tours and served a four-year hitch in the Navy. Eventually, though they never legally adopted him, the Harrimans became Peter's foster parents.

Father Eddy spent his childhood serving up milkshakes in his father's pharmacy; his son Peter was brought up in a dazzling world of millionaires and Chippendale chairs. Even the names of his schools had that ring of good crystal--Eaglebrook, Hotchkiss and Yale.

But Eddy came around often enough to make sure his son knew his musical as well as his social scales. By the time he reached Yale, Peter was already a good pianist and a weekend bandleader.

Business Quadrupled. After a two-year stint with the Army in Panama ("I spent most of my free time digging up pre-Columbian art objects"), Peter arrived back in New York and started searching for a gold-plated piano stool, just as his father had 32 years before. Duchin and his twelve-piece band were soon booked for $3,000 a week in the St. Regis Hotel's Maisonette. Almost immediately, the nightclub's business quadrupled. Peter stayed on for three years, and the Maisonette was the only cheek-to-cheek dance spot in New York, besides El Morocco, to prosper in spite of the discotheques.

This year Peter left to drum up business on his own, and now the jobs are coming in so thick he has started teaching other groups his arrangements (the piano is always the focal point) and sending them out under his own name. Among his recent customers were Mrs. Douglas Dillon, Mrs. Raymond Guest, Ethel and Joan Kennedy.

Duchin shrugs off his success, explaining: "Besides Lester Lanin and Meyer Davis, there really isn't much competition. It's awfully hard to get a name in this business--that's why I was awfully lucky to have my dad's." But he has much more than a name. With a thick shock of hair and a bemused smile fixed on his angular face, he looks like a matinee idol, plays with the enthusiasm of the young bon vivant that he is. Says White House Secretary Bess Abell: "He has a gay spirit that makes for a festive evening."

Not content with his present lot, Peter is looking for new worlds to conquer. A sometime drama student who thought acting might give him added poise at the piano, Peter has already had a bit part in The World of Henry Orient and has played summer stock. This year he signed a contract with Universal Pictures to make a movie a year, plus eight TV dramas. And if that does not keep him busy, Cheray has plans too. Last week she announced that a new generation of Duchins would appear in May. If it's a boy, Peter is already readying a baby grand.

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