By the time Averne was fourteen he was a professional musician. During the mid 1950s through the 1970s he appeared in hundreds of reviews and shows, at such popular New York venues as the Boulevard Night Club (Queens), The Palladium Ballroom, Lincoln Center, The Village Gate, Jules Podell's Copacabana, Roseland Ballroom, Harlem's Apollo Theater, The Cotton Club, Carnegie Hall, Basin Street East, The Cheetah and The New York Academy Of Music, as well as Chicago's Aragon Ballroom, Coliseo Roberto Clemente in Puerto Rico and the famed Hollywood Palladium. He found steady work and much inspiration during these years, appearing with such notables as Don Rickles, Tom Jones, Tony Bennett, Harry Belafonte, James Brown, Jerry Butler, The O'Jays, Richard Pryor, The Main Ingredient, Grover Washington Jr, Al Green, and Frankie Crocker, among others. In addition to the New York cabaret and club circuit, he performed with his own band "Arvito & His Latin Rhythms" in the Catskill Mountain Resort Area (also known as the Borscht Belt, or the Jewish Alps), a popular vacation spot for New Yorkers since the 1920s. He worked there from 1950 through 1963, as well as in Long Island's Lido Beach and Long Beach, a strip which was known for its private beach clubs and hotels. He brought his fiery dance rhythms into the Malibu Beach Club, Colony Beach Club, The Coral Reef, The Monaco, The Sands and The Shelbourne. These venues drew thousands of day-tripper/ members who arrived early to enjoy their cabanas, beaches, pools and tennis courts. Later in the evening, the patrons would dress up elegantly for dinner in the restaurants and take in star-studded shows in the nightclubs. The aforementioned clubs offered such big-name performers as Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gorme, Jackie Mason, Mal Z. Lawrence, Al Martino, Buddy Hackett, Hines, Hines and Dad; as well as the popular Latin bands of Tito Puente, Machito, Tito Rodriguez, Eddie Palmieri, Larry Harlow, Joe Cuba, La Playa Sextet and of course Arvito & His Latin Rhythms. All of these stars performed regularly at both the beach clubs and the Catskill resort hotels. Curiously, it was amidst all of this showbiz glitz that Harvey's love for Latin American music and culture further manifested itself.
