Jim brought a large drum set to the Carleton College 2001 Mid-Winter Dance.
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Jim brought a large drum set to the Carleton College 2001 Mid-Winter Dance. |
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The CTV15 crew caught Jim in action on stage during the videotaping of a concert at Concordia Academy. |
| Former Role in Roseville Big Band: | Drums (initially saxes, then valve trombone, drums, and guitar; ten years on electric bass, and the rest on drums) |
| Member during: |
1977 through 2003 |
| Occupation: |
Software engineer |
Jim also performs on trumpet and bass trombone with the Roseville Community Band. In past years he has played electric bass and numerous other instruments with the Big Band. Jim plays drum set in the pit band and occasionally imitates Elvis and does other singing for variety shows by the Silvertones, a Minneapolis women's singing group.
Jim has also played baritone horn and bassoon with the Roseville Community Band. On one memorable concert at Roseville Area High School, Jim and Glen Newton were the two bassoonists. The program included a tribute to Walt Disney, which ended with the Mickey Mouse March, and at the end of the march, the audience could see rubber gloves with Mickey Mouse faces painted on them emerging from the tops of both bassoons! Jim and Glen had pre-loaded their instruments' bells with the gloves, rubber-banded in place, and when they sustained the low B-flat at the end of the march, there was no place for the air to go but into the gloves, inflating them and waving at the audience.
Jim has also been featured with the Roseville Big Band as a solo euphonium player and vocalist. He uses another of his talents as the voice of Igor, the scientist's assistant (who sounds much like Peter Lorrie), in the band's rendition of Monster Mash.
Jim has often played euphonium in the annual TubaChristmas concerts conducted by Roseville Big Band alumna Carol Jensen.
Starting in 2001, Jim has added synthesized drum sounds, triggered by an array of electronic drum pads, to his instrumental arsenal. Dancers who hear the band play "Sing, Sing, Sing" often hear Jim play the tune "Christopher Columbus" as orchestral hits* on the pads in the middle of his free-form solo on the song.
Through his skills in eBay trading, Jim has helped the band acquire its sound system and timbales.
*In this context an "orchestral hit" is a sound sample of an orchestra playing a staccato note or chord. The orchestral hits Jim uses have a rich timbre and no definite major or minor tonality, sounding like a full orchestra (or at least the electronic equivalant) playing a unison spread over several octaves, in a room with a lot of reverberation. By configuring the drum pads, he can have one pad trigger an "A", another a "C", and others "D", "D#", "E", and high "A", the notes needed to play "Christopher Columbus".