Dear Friends,
I hope you were able to attend the pasta feed and hear some great accordion music at last month’s meeting. We have another evening of great music lined up for you again this month. After we hear a few of our members (maybe one of them will be you!) play during the first half of this month’s meeting we are fortunate to have Joe Domitrowich as our featured entertainer for our June meeting. For those of you who haven’t heard Joe play you are in for a treat. He blends acoustic accordion sounds with digital electronic technology for full melodic and complex musical arrangements. His repertoire runs the gamut of musical styles and ethnic musical genres which include Italian, French, Russian, Alpine, Slovenian, Gypsy, Latin, and Cajun along with some interesting novelty pieces. This would be a good night to invite your friends to come to the meeting and hear some great accordion music. Joe will have some of his CD’s available for purchase at the meeting.
On a less cheerful note, I have just spoken with Jerry Sbragia whose wife Eve Marie is feeling poorly and is currently staying at the Golden Living Center at 4650 Hoen Avenue in Santa Rosa. Phone: (707) 546-0471. Eva Marie is a professional accordionist, a past officer of our club and a very nice lady. She would welcome a visit from her friends while she is a resident at Golden Living Center. Eva Maria we send our wishes for a speedy recovery and hope to see you out and about soon.
Just a brief reminder regarding membership. If you have not yet submitted your yearly dues to John Pordon your membership has lapsed at this point and I urge you to attend to it. Our club is the best social and entertainment deal available and a great place to see old friends and relax and unwind and listen to good music and have a bite to eat all – at an incredible bargain price. Even if you can’t attend all of the meetings you will certainly get your money’s worth by renewing your yearly membership. As I mentioned last month we have a great new venue for our annual club picnic this year. Jeanie and Finn are hosting our picnic this year and we will have a much better facility than we have had in past years. Please try to get your reservations in as early as possible this year. It makes things so much easier for the wonderful volunteers who work so hard to bring you a good time, and saves waste by allowing us to prepare for the right number of attendees when purchasing food and drink. Please feel free to invite your friends to attend. We will have a great wooden dance floor and completely covered area for dancing. Remember there is no regular monthly meeting in July. I hope to see all of you at this months meeting as well as at the picnic in July.
Tony Mustaro
President
Accordion Club of the Redwoods
This month’s entertainment was led off by young Anthony Berger, a very talented young man who shows great ability a very short time after starting lessons. Anthony came to us after playing that same day for his school He performed Up and Down, Frank the Firemen, and Push and Pull Waltz showing a very good understanding of his instrument. We are looking for big things from this young man.
Our next performer was Joe Graverman who was joined by Dorothy Nadale on her harmonica after Joe’s first selection. Together they performed crowd pleasing renditions of Red River Valley and You Are My Sunshine. Thanks for sharing your music with us Joe and Dorothy.
The final performer of the first half was a surprise visitor, Carlo Solivan, an old friend who has a marvelous voice which he is always willing to share. Carlo, whose range goes from baritone through tenor was accompanied by Steve Albini on his Roland FR-7x for impromptu arrangements of Con Te Partiro and Torna a Surriento. As usual Carlo wowed us with his vocal skills. He also joined our club after the meeting so I welcome him and look forward to seeing and hearing him at our meetings.
Our featured performers of the evening were Roland artists Tatiana Semichastnaya and Steve Albini accompanied by Jim Lehmann on percussion. The trio performed a variety of musical and vocal selections using a variety Roland V accordions which have brought digital accordions to a new level. Tatiana is a virtuoso player who studied at the prestigious Moscow Conservatory and Steve is well known to us as a past club president and professional accordionist and vocalist. Their selections included Astoria, Por Una Cabeza,Light and Shadow, Libertango, Maruzzella, Sway (Quien Sera), Guaglione, Guarda Che Luna, Fly Me to the Moon, and Besame Mucho. It was a great show featuring some great new instruments and some great musical talents. We hope you folks will let us know when you can come and play for us again.
Following a brief intermission Kris Nelson Introduced accomplished pianist Aldo Girabaldi who kept us spellbound with his excellent variety of old favorite songs. To finish off the night Kris introduced the Petaluma’s United Methodist Church “Open Micronauts.” They featured pianist Bob Johns, violinist Candace English, Saxophone player David Scott, drummer Al Sanerco and vocalist Kris Nelson. This talented group entertained us with “Great Balls of Fire,” “As Time Goes By,” “Do You Know What It Means to Miss New Orleans?” We were fortunate top have all of them as our featured guests.
