On the fifth anniversary of the fall of Lehman Brothers, hundreds of the firm's former traders and bankers met up at B.B. King's in Times Square for a reunion.
The event, which was called "LEH Rocks On," wasn't about commemorating the demise of the once-powerful Wall Street bank. Instead, it was about bringing together old colleagues and friends to listen to Lehman alumni bands and raise funds for the 9/11 Memorial Fund Foundation.
One thing that was apparent last night is that there remains a great deal of camaraderie amongst the Lehman alums. What's more, many of them have kept each other in their professional networks across Wall Street.
"It was interesting because Lehman people scattered to different banks and hedge funds, so you have a friend at almost every institution. They always take your call. It's a very powerful network," a former Lehman employee told us.
Another former employee added that when people went to Lehman back then they intended to stay there for a long time. Ironically, when they all had to go their separate ways they left with a great business network, he explained.
"It would not have been the way I drew it up, but I have a lot of great business contacts," he told us.
One Lehman alum who was absent last night was the ex-CEO, Dick Fuld. No one expected him to show up, though.
"I doubt he makes too many public appearances," one former Lehman employee told us.
In case you missed the show, we have included highlights in the slides that follow. Now let's meet the Lehman alumni bands.
Here we are outside B.B. Kings. 'LEH' was the bank's stock ticker symbol, so the average passerby probably wouldn't recognize that it was a Lehman event.
You could tell it was a finance crowd last night. Several folks were wearing the trader uniform (blue dress shirt, fleece vest and bit loafers). Gym bags with Nomura and Barclays logos were scattered on some of the tables. Those firms took on huge blocks of Lehman employees after the bank's downfall.
There were two Lehman alumni bands — Fifth of Bourbon (Ken Umezaki, Fred Gilde, Jock Jones, Matt Fink) and The Fifth Wheel (Mike Neumann, Greg Gentile, Alex Kirk, Paul Altomonte).
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