Roseville Big Band News Emails - 2002

Free Concert at Augustana Lutheran Church, Sunday, October 27 (October 23, 2002)
Bob Lancette's Funeral (October 9, 2002)
Sit-in Night and Other News (October 2, 2002)
Late Summer and Fall Events (September 10, 2002)
Spring and Early Summer Performances (July 1, 2002)
Lyngblomsten Fundraiser Success (April 29, 2002)
2002 Had a Busy Start for the Roseville Big Band (April 6, 2002)

Free Concert at Augustana Lutheran Church, Sunday, October 27 (October 23, 2002)

To all those interested in hearing the Roseville Big Band perform:

Augustana Lutheran Church, 1400 South Robert St. in West St. Paul, is sponsoring a concert by the Roseville Big Band, featuring the Rosetones vocal quartet, this coming Sunday afternoon, October 27, 2002. The free concert will start at 4:00 p.m. and last about two hours, including intermission. There will be a reception afterward. You can see the song list on the band's web site: https://rosevillebigband.org/history/2002-10-27.htm.

This is a rare Sunday afternoon performance, and we're hoping that the day and time as well as the location will let us bring our music to a new group of music lovers. Bring lots of friends!

Other Roseville Big Band News

Ten guest performers attended our sit-in night Tuesday, October 8, 2002. They included some long-time friends of the band and some new faces, from as far away as Nashville. It's always a delight to share our music with other performers!

Interest in the Roseville Big Band web site (https://rosevillebigband.org) continues to grow, and so far in October the site has had an average of 167 visits per day, the highest yet. The total number of visitors to the site is now over 8500. If you're new to the internet and web browsing and would like some general advice on how to get the most out of our web site, click the underlined words "click here" on the site's home page for some tips.

If you have some time to explore the Roseville Big Band web site, a good place to start is by clicking each of the red buttons in the navigation bar at the left. Then learn more about particular topics by clicking the hyperlinks on each page. Underlined words and speaker icons are hyperlinks, as are many of the pictures on the site. The information you'll find on the site's 486 pages ranges from specifics about the Roseville Big Band to general musical topics such as improvising (https://rosevillebigband.org/personnel/MoreGN/Improv1.htm) and a study of the creation of a modern composition (https://rosevillebigband.org/personnel/MoreGN/TheElements.htm).

I hope to see you at Sunday's concert!

Glen

Bob Lancette's Funeral (October 9, 2002)

It is with great sadness that we mourn the passing of Bob Lancette, former director of the Roseville Big Band and Roseville Community Band.

Some of you who are receiving this email knew Bob personally, but all of you have benefitted from the legacy of Bob's leadership of the two bands sponsored by the Roseville Parks and Recreation department. Bob is the person who resurrected the Roseville Big Band, which had gone defunct under some previous directors of the Roseville Community Band. His tireless promotion of both groups included proposing the hangar dances that the Roseville Big Band now play for twice a year under the sponsorship of the Commemorative Air Force.

You can read more about Bob's innovation and leadership of both bands at this URL: https://rosevillebigband.org/personnel/former/BobLancette.html. What you won't find at that URL, which focuses on Bob's musical achievements on behalf of the City of Roseville, is information about what a fine person Bob was, in or out of a musical setting. Ask anyone who knew him when he lived in Minnesota, and you'll learn of his warmth and innate ability to draw people together and build friendships.

The memorial service for Bob will be held Friday, October 11, 2002, at 11:00 a.m., with visitation one hour prior at Washburn-McReavy Edina Chapel, W. 50th St. & Vernon Ave at Hwy 100 (952-920-3996). Interment will be at Ft. Snelling National Cemetery.

Glen

Sit-in Night and Other News (October 2, 2002)

If you're interested in playing a rehearsal with the Roseville Big Band, we'd be delighted to have you attend our sit-in night Tuesday, October 8, 2002. (Bring friends, too, if they'd like to play along with the band that night.)

Sit-in night will be held in the dining room of St. Michael's Lutheran Church, 1660 W. Co. Rd. B in Roseville, about a block and a half west of Snelling Ave. N. The church is on the south side of the street. The dining room is in the southeast corner of the church, next to the parking lot. There's a map on the Roseville Big Band web site: https://rosevillebigband.org/StMichaelsMap.htm

We'll rehearse from 7:30 to 9:30. Please bring a music stand if you have one!

Other News

Weather was ideal for the September 23, 2002, Commemorative Air Force Bomber's Moon Ball, and we had an excellent crowd. Thanks again to the talented subs who helped us out by playing for the dance! The Roseville Big Band web site includes pictures from the dance (www.rosevillebigband.org/galleries/CAF-F2002.htm) and the list of songs we actually played (www.rosevillebigband.org/history/CAFF02Actual.htm).

Interest in the Roseville Big Band web site (https://rosevillebigband.org) continues to grow, and in September the site had an average of 137 visits per day, the highest yet, and considerably more than last September's 74 visits per day. Thanks to Keith Miner for adding JavaScript code to the page footers to display the entire frame set (including header, navigation bar, and content window) if someone displays a page on the site by going directly to it from a search engine or a link like the ones in this email.

Remember that if you're looking for specific information on the web site, you can click the Search button in the navigation bar at the left, fill in descriptive words, and get a list of matching web pages.

I hope to see some of you at sit-in night!

Glen

Late Summer and Fall Events (September 10, 2002)

Roseville Big Band members, subs, and supporters,

Our fall season is off to a fine start as the band prepares for the Commemorative Air Force's Bomber's Moon Ball, September 21, from 8:00 p.m. until midnight. Those of you who are novice swing dancers will want to arrive in time for Cindy and Terry's free swing dance lessons. They'll begin at 7:00, and they're always a lot of fun!

Rhythm & Swing will enliven the evening with swing dance demonstrations, and the band will play a lot of the same timeless tunes heard at World War II USO dances, as well as memorable big band music from more recent years. With Kirk and Diane vacationing in Italy, we're fortunate to have two outstanding vocalists helping Karen and Glen round out the vocal quartet: Barb Harvey, who has performed with the Roseville Big Band several times in the past will sing alto, and Reeves Cary, the featured tenor vocalist of the Classic Big Band and a member of the Nostalgics quartet, will make his debut performance with the Roseville Big Band.

You can visit the band's web site for a sneak preview of the songs on the dance lineup: https://rosevillebigband.org/history/CAFF02Tentative.htm.

In contrast with previous years, when we and our audiences had to deal with rain or sweltering heat, all three of this year's concert dates in Roseville's Central Park were sunny with moderate temperatures. Our final concert in the park, July 23, lasted a full 90 minutes, but most of the 417 audience members stayed for the entire performance. 2002 Roseville Area High School graduate Jesse Farrell was the featured soloist on "Kids Are Pretty People" and joined the Roseville Big Band trombone section on "Four" and "Embraceable You", each of which has five trombone parts.

This month, the Roseville Big Band web site saw its 8000th visitor, and the average of 127 visits per day in August was the highest yet.The most popular songs on the site in August were the audio files of "Woodchopper's Ball", "Mas Que Nada", "Moon River", "It Had to Be You", and "In the Mood", but a number of visitors also found the streaming video of excerpts from our medley of "It Don't Mean a Thing if it Ain't Got that Swing" and "Sing, Sing, Sing", which we performed at the Raider Jazz Festival in March. The band's song list had the most hits (both musical hits and internet accesses!) of any part of the site except the home page.

In the next couple of months after the Bomber's Moon Ball, we have three events of special interest: Our fall sit-in night will be Tuesday, October 8. Come join us in the cafeteria at St. Michael's Church in Roseville for an enjoyable evening playing big band music. Next, we hope to see you in the audience at 4:00 p.m., Sunday, October 27 for our concert at Augustana Lutheran Church in West St. Paul. Then mark Saturday, November 23, on your calendars for the fundraising dance for Children's Hospital at the Radisson Riverfront in St. Paul. You can find out about these activities and more on the Public Performances page of the Roseville Big Band web site: https://rosevillebigband.org/PublicEvents.htm.

Glen

Spring and Early Summer Performances (July 1, 2002)

Roseville Big Band members, subs, and supporters,

We’re just about ready to put on an entertaining Independence Day concert at Roseville’s Central Park band shell. We’ll work out some last-minute logistics and polish the fine points at tomorrow’s rehearsal.

A highlight of the concert will be the introduction of Keith Miner’s latest composition, “Still Love You”. The band rehearsed it last week for the first time, and after the rehearsal, Keith and I decided that the vocal parts should be pitched a step higher, so for tomorrow’s rehearsal I’ve produced revision 2.0 of my arrangement, relying heavily on Finale 2002 to simplify the mechanics of the key change. The arrangement also features a call and response between the brass section and the band’s outstanding electric bassist, Mike Wobig.

Another highlight of the concert will be the re-appearance of the bass saxophone, along with the use of baritone, tenor, alto, and soprano saxes. Kay Foster and Bill Pearson will reprise their “dueling big saxes” version of “Don’t Get Around Much Anymore”, which they last performed on our July 27, 1999, concert in the park. Kay will also play her bass sax on one or two other selections.

The ever-popular Rhythm & Swing Dancers will once again appear with the band, as will the Rosetones vocal quartet.

You can find the full song list on our web site at https://rosevillebigband.org/history/2002-07-04.htm.

Remember that the concert starts at 7:00 and you’ll be competing with thousands of other Central Park visitors for parking spaces, so allow plenty of time to park in the nearby neighborhoods and walk to the amphitheater. After the Roseville Big Band performance, stay to listen to the Roseville Community Band and watch the fireworks at dusk. The weather should be cooler on the 4th of July, but if it’s still too warm for you, watch our live broadcast on channel 15, CTV North Suburbs.

Our first concert in the park, June 11, was a fine beginning to our summer concert season, with over 400 concertgoers watching us in person while countless others saw us live on channel 15 and on the later rebroadcasts. Dorothy Doring, our guest vocalist, thrilled the audience with her sophisticated interpretations, and many people complimented the band on its solid performance.

The guests at the Roberge-Nielsen wedding reception, held June 1 at the Prom Center, also had fine things to say about the band. For that evening, we played a song mix with a higher proportion of 50’s songs, several of them picked out by Bob Nielsen, father of the groom and the band’s regular 4th trumpet player. (For that performance, Gene Phares filled in for Bob. You’ll also hear Gene on our July 4 concert, filling in for Mark Lee.) One special musical event was the vocal duet on “Sentimental Journey” by Bob’s wife, Sandra Nielsen, and her sister, Linda Johnson, accompanied by the band.

Remember that if you’d like to see the song lists for past Roseville Big Band performances, you can find many of them in the history section of our web site:
https://rosevillebigband.org/history/index.html.

The Commemorative Air Force Dance, May 18, was more heavily attended than other recent hangar dances. We hope this upward trend will continue with the fall dance on September 21, 2002. Guest vocalist David Andrew Anderson was outstanding, and he and I introduced a new Roseville Big Band vocal duet version of “Spanish Eyes” in the second set. Those who missed seeing Rhythm & Swing dance to “Rock Around the Clock” at the hangar dance will have a second chance on July 4, when they perform the same selection with the Roseville Big Band at the Central Park band shell.

You can find out more about Dorothy, David, Rhythm & Swing, and other guest artists featured with the Roseville Big Band in the “Guest Artists” section of our web site: https://rosevillebigband.org/personnel/guestsubs/guests.html.

In May, the Roseville Big Band web site saw the most traffic of any month yet. Although the numbers are small in comparison with commercial sites, our average 124 vists per day was nearly double the daily average of a year ago. The statistics that our ISP keeps tell us what attracts visitors to the site. People come to the web site to learn about our schedule and the songs in our repertoire, to peruse our historical information, and to look at our picture galleries. Beyond these most popular sections of the web site, the statistics show that visitors are very interested in band members, our CDs, and general overview information (“About Us” and “FAQs”).

We also have many visitors interested in general musical topics found on our web site: In May we had 124 hits on our soprano trombone page, 64 on our tuba and euphonium page, 58 on our piccolo trumpet page, and numbers of visitors in this same range listening to our audio excerpts from Woodchopper’s Ball, Rosie the Riveter, Mas Que Nada, and Rock Around the Clock.

Remember that if you’d like to find these pages on our web site, you can locate many of them with a general search engine like Google, but you can also use the Search button in the navigation bar on the web site to find information within the site.

Glen

Lyngblomsten Fundraiser Success (April 29, 2002)

Roseville Big Band Members and Subs,

First, remember that there is no rehearsal April 30. As usual, we are taking a week off following a major performance.

Second, thanks to all who made the Lyngblomsten Foundation's "Spring Rhapsody: An Evening in New York" a musical success. Our first selection, "New York, New York", got more people onto the dance floor than any previous band had done. And we had more guests staying until the end than in any previous years of the fundraiser. Several of the organizers and guests commented to me on how ideally our musical selections fit the tastes of the audience, including some who didn't dance but stayed longer than they had in the past, just to see and hear us perform. You can see the final song list at https://rosevillebigband.org/cgi-bin/rbb.pl?c=history/2002-04-26.htm

Making their first appearance with the Roseville Big Band were Gene Phares, co-lead trumpet; Greg Michnay, lead trombone; Tom Simpson, second trombone; and Dorothy Doring, vocal. Ted Hermann, string bass, and Jim Foss, guitar, also filled in. Special thanks go to these talented subs!

Glen

2002 Had a Busy Start for the Roseville Big Band (April 6, 2002)

Roseville Big Band members, subs, and supporters,

The new year started with a concert in a new location for us. On January 8, the residents and staff at the Little Sisters of the Poor in St. Paul enjoyed our mix of time-honored vocals and instrumentals, and several took the time to talk with us afterward. One lady who commended us on our performance had played piano in a big band in the 1920’s.

On February 2, we took our annual road trip to Northfield to play for the Carleton College Mid-Winter Dance. This was the first public use of the band’s new timbales, and they added an appealing rhythmic color to our mambos and other Latin selections. We also enjoyed the vocal talent of Carleton senior Megan Orwig, who sang with the band two previous years as well. You can find pictures from the dance on the band’s web site: https://rosevillebigband.org/cgi-bin/rbb.pl?c=galleries/Carleton2002.htm

Later in the same month, we hosted the River City Jazz Orchestra for another of our annual joint rehearsals. It’s always enjoyable to share our musical experiences with other adult amateurs and hear their interpretations of songs in their repertoire.

In March, we performed twice, supporting music education in two different ways.

Putting on the Ritz, March 9, raised $1081.63 for the Roseville Area High School music department. The weather was unusually cold and icy, so attendance was down from the 300 of last year. The 210 paid attendees included a large number of fine ballroom dancers, and we enjoyed watching them while we played, as well as watching the outstanding dance demos during our breaks. There was also musical participation from the school. In addition to our guest percussionists, RAHS vocal music teacher Tim McMillin sang with the band, and senior Will Geng played an alto sax solo with us that evening.

Randy and Monica Oehrlein, who organized Putting on the Ritz this year and last, forwarded an email they received from one of the dancers, Don Reichert. He said, in part, “I believe the Roseville Big Band is the best big band in the Twin Cities. They are easy to dance to and have a very precise beat that makes you want to dance.” (If you like reading that kind of praise for the band, you can find more on our web page, “What They Say About the Roseville Big Band”.)

We were the featured guest band at the Raider Jazz Festival, performing at Roosevelt Middle School after jazz bands from six middle schools from the northern suburbs. It was a special treat for us to have faculty members Rich Raaen, Mike Park, and Jim Guckenberg perform with us on some songs. Students could see from our example that there are opportunities to play exciting music as amateurs, and the practice time they put in now will help them to develop the skills they need to play in a group like ours after they’ve graduated and begun their careers. You can see and hear a sample of our performance of our final selection, a 1930’s swing medley of “It Don’t Mean a Thing if It Ain’t Got That Swing” and “Sing, Sing, Sing” on the band’s web site: https://rosevillebigband.org/cgi-bin/rbb.pl?c=audio/ItDontSingSingSing/IDSSSAudio.htm

When asked about where I find these outstanding amateur musicians that sing and play with the Roseville big Band, I’ve often commented that the hardest ones to find are guitarists who are good enough to play the difficult big band styles, yet aren’t already working full time as guitarists or at least committed to other big bands whose schedules conflict with ours. However, this year has been a welcome exception. Roseville Big Band guitarist Carl Berger played on our first concert, but now that he’s on a temporary leave of absence, we’ve had not one but three very capable replacement guitarists. Thanks to James Holdman, Jim Foss, and John O’Loughlin for stepping up to the challenge.

Thanks also go to the other subs who have performed with us on our 2002 performances: Deb Asselanis on baritone sax, Mary Ewald on alto sax, and Mark Olson and George Henly on trombones.

Our next event is the sit-in night, Tuesday, April 16, in the cafeteria of St. Michael’s Church, 1660 W. Co. Rd. B in Roseville. We’ve already heard from a couple of people who have never been to one of our rehearsals before but are planning to come this time. If you have friends who’d like to see what it’s like to rehearse with the Roseville Big Band, bring them on the 16th. We rehearse from 7:30 to 9:30, but guests are welcome to arrive and leave at any time.

Friday, April 26, we play for the annual Lyngblomsten Foundation fundraising dinner and dance at the Prom Center ballroom in Oakdale. If you’d like more information about this or any of the band’s other activities, just refer to our Public Performances web page:
https://rosevillebigband.org/cgi-bin/rbb.pl?c=PublicEvents.htm

The Roseville Big Band web site (www.rosevillebigband.org) continues to grow in popularity. March, 2002, was the busiest month yet, with an average of 114 visits per day and over 46,000 “hits” for the month. Recently, our audio files have been of particular interest to web site visitors, and Mas Que Nada topped the list in March.

Every now and then, someone will write and let us know that we hit the mark in our publicity and historical documentation on the web site. In February, Bob Bierscheid, the director of Roseville Parks and Recreation, sent us an email saying “I brought up your web site for the schedule and I have to tell you that that is the BEST WEB SITE that I have ever seen (and I look at lots of them). It is attractive, functional, enticing and entertaining--GREAT JOB!!” Thanks, Bob!

Did you miss one of our previous Roseville Big Band informational emails? You can find them on the web at
https://rosevillebigband.org/cgi-bin/rbb.pl?c=history/RBBnews2001-2.htm

Glen

Click the year to read the Roseville Big Band news emails for 2000, 2001, and 2003.

This page was last updated
Friday, June 18, 2021.


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