Author Archives: Dan Bergeson

Give to the Max Day Nov. 19

2020 has been a challenging year for all non-profit organizations and Vintage Band Festival is no exception. Due to COVID-19 we found it necessary to cancel all of our planned events for the year, including the Vintage Band Festival One-Day Mini-fest scheduled for July 31 and Tuba Christmas in Northfield, scheduled for December 5.

We are hoping that 2021 will be a better year for VBF and to that end we are fundraising for future activities.

Vintage Band Festival is participating in Give to the Max Day (GTMD20) as part of the VBF 2020 fund drive. GTMD20 will take place November 19 from 12 am-11:59:59 pm. One of the benefits for donors who make gifts during GTMD20 is the chance to be winners in over 100 prize drawings. If you are selected, an additional donation will be made to VBF. Prizes range from $500 to $10,000!

Here is a list of the prize drawings during GTMD20:

$500 Golden Tickets every 15 minutes
$1,000 Hourly Golden Tickets
$500 Early Giving Golden Tickets (1 each day between November 1-19)
$10,000 Super-sized Golden Ticket (drawn from all donations)

How to donate to Vintage Band Festival during GTMD20:

Go to www.givemn,org
Click on the green “Donate Now” button
Do a search for “Vintage Band Music Festival”
Click on the green “Donate” button
Choose your suggested giving level or fill in your unique amount
Enter your credit card information
Accept our thanks!

The goal for the VBF 2020 fund drive (through December 31, 2020) is $5,000. As of today, we have raised 26% of that amount. Give to the Max Day would be an excellent time for our friends to help us make significant progress toward reaching or exceeding our goal.

Early giving is now open for GTMD20. You can donate anytime between today and 11:59:59 pm on November 19, 2020. Please use the hashtag #GTMD20 when you share any news about Vintage Band Festival on social media.

Tuba Christmas 2020 in Northfield has been cancelled

2020 has turned out to be like nothing any of us born after the end of World War II have ever experienced. We had to cancel the Vintage Band Festival mini-fest that would have taken place on August 1, 2020. Our community of Northfield, the town that defeated the James-Younger gang’s attempted bank robbery in 1876, cancelled the annual Defeat of Jesse James Days celebration for the first time ever since its beginning in 1948. And the internationally reknowned St. Olaf Christmas Festival for 2020 has just been cancelled. All of that will likely make the next sentence easier to understand.

The Vintage Band Festival Board of Directors has decided to cancel Tuba Christmas for 2020. The annual low brass holiday showcase was to have taken place on Saturday, December 5, 2020 at Carleton College in Northfield as it has for the past three years. However, due to the obviously compromising conditions caused by the threat of COVID-19, particularly in indoor settings, this is the wisest and safest course of action.

In the meantime, please support arts organizations of all sorts with whatever financial support and encouragement you can offer. This is a very challenging time for musicians at all levels of engagement, from school children in middle school band to professionals in the finest orchestras in the country.

We hope to bring Vintage Band Festival back to the stage in 2021 and to that end we will continue to monitor guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Minnesota Department of Health as well as our community partners here in Northfield.

Leap Year Swing Dance February 29

Put on your dancing shoes for Leap Year Swing Dance, February 29, 2020. The event will be held at the Northfield Ballroom (1055 HWY 3 North) and will run from 7:30-10:00 pm. Music will be provided by Bend in the River Big Band with vocalist Linnea Nelson Marrin. Victor Albrecht, a local dance instructor, will provide free swing dance lessons beginning at 6:45. There will be a cash bar. General admission tickets are $15. Student admission is $10.

Invite your friends and neighbors. All are welcome!

This event is a benefit for Vintage Band Festival.

Don’t forget: Tuba Christmas 2019 is December 7!

Tuba Christmas 2019 in Northfield, MN.

Skinner Chapel, Carleton College, 405 1st St E.

Registration opens at 12 pm.

$10 registration fee for musicians. Music for Tuba Christmas is the book “Carols for a Merry Tuba Christmas”, which will be available for purchase at the event if you don’t have one already. Books are $20. Tuba Christmas scarves, hats and headbands will also be available for purchase. Please bring a music stand is you have one and don’t forget to decorate your instrument!

Rehearsal is at 1 pm.

Concert is at 3 pm.

Concert is free and open to the public.

Tuba Christmas in Northfield December 7, 2019

Vintage Band Festival, in Northfield, Minnesota, is presenting Tuba Christmas on Saturday, December 7, 2019 at 3 pm. The event is co-sponsored by Carleton College and will take place in Skinner Memorial Chapel on the Carleton campus in Northfield. Registration opens at noon, rehearsal will take place at 1pm and the concert will be at 3pm. The Conductor of Tuba Christmas in Northfield will be Dr. Paul Niemisto, retired music faculty at St. Olaf College.

Tuba Christmas is a national activity that takes place in more than 300 locations across the United States. In each location (churches, hotel and mall atria, outdoor settings, colleges and universities, music halls) tuba and euphonium players get together under the leadership of a local musician or music educator to play Christmas carols. The sound that results is extremely rich and moving. The participants have a fabulous experience and return to play again year after year. Participant ages range from 11-80+.

If you play tuba, sousaphone, euphonium or baritone, please join us! If you’re a teacher of students who play those instruments, please bring your whole section! Also, please bring a music stand if you have one.

Participation fee for musicians is $10. Admission for the audience is free. This is a family-friendly event!

Thanks to everyone who made VBF 2019 possible!

Several weeks have passed since the last notes of Vintage Band Festival 2019 have faded to silence, but it’s still timely to once again thank all the folks who contributed in any way towards the success of the weekend. Click on the images below to read the names of the individuals in the many categories of our organization and its operation.

Most especially, thanks to those who contributed financially to the festival. Without adequate funding, it would not be possible to stage Vintage Band Festival. Our donors rock!

VBF 2019 Minnesota Bands: Mariachi Mi Tierra

Mariachi Mi Tierra is the oldest Mariachi ensemble in the Minneapolis and St. Paul metropolitan area. Rosalio Castro (trumpet), who formed the group in 2003, has played various Mexican styles of music since he was in his teens. Eduardo Castro (also trumpet) is the group’s director. Together, the Castros have brought together a group that produces the full sound of authentic mariachi in Minnesota. The group’s repertoire includes a number of regional and current favorites. In addition to events in the local Mexican community, Mariachi Mi Tierra plays at schools, colleges, businesses, casinos, and festivals. Mariachi Mi Tierra performed previously at the Vintage Band Festival in 2014, 2015 and 2018. Catch them Thursday, August 1 at 7 pm on the Bridge Square Main Stage, immediately following Jack Brass Band. You won’t be disappointed!

Mariachi Mi Tierra

VBF 2019 Minnesota Bands: Jack Brass Band

The Jack Brass Band formed in 1999 in the Twin Cities metro. Based on the traditions of New Orleans brass bands, they are ambassadors of the Crescent City’s rich musical history. The 8-piece band plays “Feel-Good Music” for audiences of any age, for any occasion. JBB has the ability and repertoire to play everything from old New Orleans jazz from Louis Armstrong’s era, to the modern street Mardi-Gras anthems with the instrumentation, feel, and energy they have mastered through countless gigs, parades, festival appearances, and trips to New Orleans to listen, learn, and play alongside the masters. The band is led by percussionist Mike Olander.

Jack Brass Band

Vaudeville 1919! at Vintage Band Festival

The North Star Cinema Orchestra will present Vaudeville, 1919 at the Kracum Concert Hall in the Weitz Center for Creativity on the Carleton College campus on Sunday, August 4 at 7:00 p.m. The presentation is a re-creation of a Vaudeville show featuring authentic songs, jokes, skits, and magic lantern slides from 100 years ago. The show will also feature the orchestra accompanying Back Stage, a 1919 film starring Roscoe Arbuckle and Buster Keaton.

Featured in the program are singers Victoria Vargas and Rick Penning. Also featured will be Chester, the Wonder Dog, who will perform in a dog act.

Other members of the orchestra are: Martha Jamsa, flute, Nina Olsen, clarinet, Lynn Deichert, trumpet, Liz Ericksen, violin, Matt McCright, piano, Connie Martin, bass, and David Miller, percussion. Matthew Zimmerman is the projectionist. The ensemble is directed by Ron Rodman, Dye Family Professor of Music at Carleton College, and Director of the Carleton Symphony Band.

Admission to the concert is $10, but is free to youth under 18 and seniors over 65. Admission is also free for anyone with a VBF pin. Proceeds go to the Vintage Band Festival.

The concert is sponsored by the Carleton Dean of the College Office and the Carleton Music Department.

VBF 2019 Minnesota Bands: St. Cloud Municipal Band

The St. Cloud Municipal Band is believed to have started after the Civil War (1865), when union soldiers brought their instruments back home. At that time they were called the St Cloud Union Band, which later changed to the St. Cloud Municipal Band. We do not know for sure when the band came into existence, but in an obituary dated from 1875, it was stated that a member played with the band “for a number of years” by that time. The band was supported by community groups until the 1940s, when it became a program of the city of St. Cloud, Minnesota. However, by the early 2000s, the city no longer wanted the liability of the band anymore, so it asked the group to form its own nonprofit organization. This the first time that St. Cloud Municipal Band has appeared at Vintage Band Festival.

St. Cloud Municipal Band