He was born in
Middletown, Connecticut, United States. Pastor began playing saxophone when he was sixteen. He played
tenor sax with John Cavallaro (1927),
Irving Aaronson (1928–30), and
Austin Wylie (1930), then opened his own night club in Hartford, Connecticut and led the band there for three years. After that, he played with
Smith Ballew (1934),
Joe Venuti,
Paul Fredricks,
Vincent Lopez, and
Artie Shaw's first (1936–37) and second (1937–39) orchestras. In November 1939, when Shaw walked off the bandstand in the
Cafe Rouge located inside the
Hotel Pennsylvania (essentially quitting his own band), Pastor was soon coaxed into leading his own big band, which he did from 1939 to 1959. ==Radio==