The Sinatra-Farney Fan Club was a performer's collective of sorts, an appreciation for the crooning vocal jazz epitomized by artists such as Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby, and Brazilian born Dick Farney (b. Farnésio Dutra, a Carioca) being the thread that unified all of its members.

[9] In 1950 the death of the mother of two of the founding members stranded the club without a rehearsal headquarters and it was at this point that Alf began to pursue a professional musical career.

[10] Alf received his first professional break in 1952 when he was hired (on Dick Farney's recommendation) as the pianist at the newly inaugurated Cantina do César where his appointed task was, apparently, to “aid the digestion of the guests”.

[11] The food proving in most a cases a meager incentive for the customers’ return, the cantina's owner, César de Alencar (a popular radio host in Rio at the time),[5] soon converted the space into a proper club—or inferninho (little hell)—and gave Johnny Alf free musical reign.

[12] For two years Alf contented himself with ephemeral engagements at clubs including the Monte Carlo in Gávea, the Clube da Chave, the Mandarim, and the Drink before settling at the Hotel Plaza nightclub in 1954.

The Hotel Plaza nightclub was known throughout Copacabana as a haunted venue, which conveniently allowed Alf the freedom to experiment musically to a degree that would not have been possible had he been playing for anyone other than his loyal fan-base.

[12] During the early hours of the evening before the club had attracted any audience, Alf would hold impromptu jam sessions with whoever happened to show up and it was by way of these improvisatory collaborations that the harmonic and rhythmic structures that would eventually blossom into the style now known as Bossa Nova, were originally developed.

[16] Johnny Alf died on March 4, 2010, in Santo Andre, Brazil (just outside São Paulo, his home of the past fifty years) of complications caused by prostate cancer.

[12] New York Times columnist Larry Rohter relates, on behalf of Alf's music, that it possessed “a light and airy feeling that expressed the optimism and joie de vivre that Brazilians think of as among their defining national traits”.

While we cannot lay to rest these disagreements we can say confidently that Johnny Alf was, in his endeavor to mix traditional Brazilian music with American jazz, a sound innovator, and a great influence and inspiration to his peers, some of whom would go on to acquire fame under the heading Bossa Nova.

“From him I learned all of the modern harmonies that Brazilian music began to use in the bossa nova, samba-jazz and instrumental songs” said pianist and arranger João Donato, “He opened the doors for us with his way of playing piano, with its jazz influence.