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Traveling all over the US and
beyond! |
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Below is an
update of Squeezebox events from October 2009 until February
2010. Enjoy! |
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Hello
again everybody! I wrote this update from “the road” on
our way back from performing in Arizona, and I must
acknowledge how lucky we are to travel this great country
and see so many different sights and different people!
It’s been a couple months since our last column, so
there’s lots to share with you. Now for a recap of a few
of the highlights from the past couple months with
Squeezebox:
October
2009 brought Squeezebox to the Columbus Maennerchor in
Columbus, OH. The Maennerchor is a German men’s singing
society, and they also have a Dammenchor and a Kinderchor
(women’s chorus and children’s chorus). Neighboring
choruses also performed in addition to several different
musical acts over the 3 day Oktoberfest celebration.
Located in downtown Columbus Ohio in German Village, it’s
also close the world famous “Schmidt’s German Restaurant”,
which has delicious German food. Definitely a place to
check out sometime!
Also in
October, Squeezebox made their first appearance at Blob’s
Park in Jessup, MD and alternated with “The Boys From
Baltimore”. This great dance hall with a HUGE dance floor
and seating to accommodate over 800 people was closed for
a couple years, but recently reopened and has been
featuring polka music every weekend. On the evening we
performed, we were amazed to see well over 600 people of
ALL AGES in attendance, dancing and having a great time.
Please support this great establishment for they are doing
all they can to keep polka music going strong in the
Baltimore area! The following day we trekked up to the
Bristol Polish American Citizen’s Club and had a great
time with all the great folks in attendance, including
Dick and Joanne Pillar. The Pillar’s said they were
hoping to get their festivals back up and running in the
near future, so stay tuned for more details as they emerge
in the future. |
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September and October are very busy months for Squeezebox,
and we were busy playing nearly every weekend. Also in
October we had the honor to perform at the Windsor Casino
for Polkapalooza and we sold out a bus trip for the event
and packed a busload of 51 our fans and brought them with
us. The Jimmy Sturr Orchestra was taped at this event for
a TV special which is due to be aired this spring on PBS.
Check your local listings for when it will be shown in
your area. As a side note: Following this one day Friday
performance, Mollie headed to Iowa for gigs with her dad’s
band “The Jim Busta Band”, and Ted headed to Pennsylvania
for gigs with “John Gora & Gorale” on Saturday and Sunday…
ah… the life of a musician! We’re often driving much
more than we’re actually playing!
October
finished with gigs at the DANK Club in Benton Harbor, MI,
an Oktoberfest at Kenyon College in Gambier, OH, and on
Saturday October 31, we played in South Milwaukee for
Betzel Smith to a great crowd with a special guest
musician, Fred Ziwich from Cleveland.
Immediately following the dance in South Milwaukee, we
jumped in the van and drove straight down to New Braunfels,
TX for their annual “Wurstfest”. New Braunfels is located
between San Antonio and Austin, so it’s easy to find and
easy to get to. This was our first appearance at this
Texas tribute to sausage, and all I can say is WOW!!! We
were blown away by the hospitality of the festival
committee, the enormous selection of food (ever tried
fried pickles or chicken fried bacon?), the quality of the
sound at each of the stages, and the variety of bands that
performed there. Most of the dancing takes place in the
main hall, where we played on Monday evening, and the
other stages are set up with a lot of seating so it’s more
of a show setting, and the response we got from the crowd
for the shows was exceptional. We were honored to have
our good friend Fred Ziwich sit in with us for all 3 days
at Wurstfest and the people loved the sound with the extra
musician, and of course, Mollie’s exceptional vocals,
musicianship and showmanship. We were also surprised to
see our good friends Bob and Anita Siarkowski who made the
last minute trip down to TX to see us perform.
Additionally, some of the very best bands in their
respective genres performed there including the Jimmy
Sturr Orchestra and Alex Meixner. They get over 120,000
people in attendance during the week of festivities, and
there’s a very large contingent of young people that
attend the festival, many with crazy hats or dressed in
traditional attire. “Wurstfest” is certainly one of the
very finest festivals that we have ever encountered, and
we would highly recommend you check it out if you ever
have a chance.
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In November,
Squeezebox performed in Frankenmuth, MI at the Bavarian Inn for
the annual fundraiser for the Marv Herzog scholarship fund. This
yearly event is a great one, with the Bavarian Inn beautifully
decorated for Christmas, and a packed house of responsive people
enjoying the music and dancing. Also, the Marv Herzog Reunion
band performed that evening, bringing back the sound that made
Marv so popular throughout the years. Plans are underway for
another event with Squeezebox and the Marv Herzog Reunion Band in
November 2010, so contact Teresa Herzog for more details and
advance tickets.
The following
evening we performed for the Deer Hunter’s Ball in Maple City,
MI. This crowd loves their polkas and waltzes, and boy do those
people dance know how to have a good time and dance! With a
beautiful wooden dance floor and dances throughout the year, this
is another great place to catch some great polka bands. Following
the Maple
City
dance, we drove through the night via the upper peninsula of
Michigan
on our way to Bullshooter’s in Weston, WI for a dance. This is a
large country bar that has polka bands on Sunday afternoons. They
also have a nice large dance floor, lots of seating, and a fully
stocked bar and kitchen.
Every year in
December, Squeezebox performs a couple of Christmas sing-a-longs
with dances following the sing-along, and this year, the first of
those was in Kewaskum, WI at the Amerahn Ballroom where we played
to a full house. These sing-alongs are great because they give
you a chance to get in the holiday spirit with the mix of English
and German Christmas songs. Thanks to Dennis Gehring and WTKM in
Hartford for sponsoring this annual event.
The following
day, we headed to our “home base”, The Bavarian Haus in Deshler,
OH for another Christmas sing-along and dance, and this dance was
PACKED! It seemed every chair and table in the entire hall was
full, and even with the huge wooden dance floor it was full all
afternoon. We were fortunate to have Jim Busta (Mollie’s Dad)
from the Jim Busta Band join us for a couple songs, and the people
loved it, lining up in front of the stage cheering! The Bavarian
Haus holds dances every Sunday afternoon from early September
through May, and then they have an annual “Schuetzenfest” in
June. This is by far the nicest and largest facility for dancing
in Northwest Ohio and they also have a full kitchen with delicious food for
all their Sunday afternoon dances.
We finished 2009
with a New Year’s Eve celebration at the Bavarian Haus, and a few
short weeks later, we were headed to Florida for the Ultimate
Polka Cruise. 5 Bands headlined the cruise including The Polka
Family, Chad Przybilski, John Gora & Gorale, The Toledo
Polkamotion Reunion Band and Squeezebox, and we had around 270
people in our group! We had a great time, and several of the
bands performed on the main deck of the ship on a couple evenings
and it was great to see the response from the “non-polka people”
that were also on the ship. Polkas in the Caribbean in January on
a cruise ship while it’s cold and snowy back home…. Does it get
much better than this?
Our next major
trip was to
Arizona
in February, thanks in no small part to Sue Flores, a promoter in
the Phoenix area, who came through for us after some previously
booked engagements were unexpectedly cancelled. Also, our good
friend, Gene Swick helped out with the weekend. If only more
people were like Gene and Sue, this whole polka scene could be
dramatically different.
In Arizona we
had 4 engagements in a row, starting with the Pulaski Club in
Phoenix on Friday. This compact and classy hall in
Phoenix
was filled with over 170 people! They bring in bands usually at
least once a month during the winter season, so check with Dave at
the Pulaski club for a schedule. The following day we performed
for Sue for a house party, which was a lot of fun. Sometimes, the
smaller the hall, the more fun it is, and the Saturday engagement
was definitely one of those events. Following the dance, we had a
great time by having a potluck with the people who attended the
dance. It sure is nice getting to know so many of you!
On Sunday, we
performed at
Greenfield
Village
in Mesa, AZ. When we walked in to set up (after numerous detours
due to road construction), we were astonished to see the hall was
already FULL! According to the promoter, there were at least 430
people in attendance (based on an early rough count), which we
were told is one of the largest crowds they have ever had for a
Sunday polka dance at the hall. It was nice to see so many of the
snowbirds, and they particularly enjoyed it when Mollie’s Dad
joined us on concertina for a few numbers.
There are some
other special friends that helped us out for the Arizona weekend
that we would like to acknowledge: Jeff Heinz from WDEZ Radio (www.wdez.com)
and the Music Connection Band from
Wausau
filled in with us on drums for the weekend and did a TREMENDOUS
job. Also, Robbie Piatkowski from Canastota, NY helped out by
providing what seemed like endless laughs, and also helped by
driving down with the equipment with Ted and joined us for a
couple songs each night. Thank you to you two guys for all your
help and friendship! Lastly, thanks to all the folks who made the
trip down to Arizona from “up north” just to attend our dances and
thanks to the folks from Ohio and Wisconsin for inviting us to
some delicious meals at house parties preceding and following our
gigs. We look forward to coming back to Arizona next spring!
We finished our
Arizona
performances with a 2 piece one hour show (just Ted and Mollie) on
Monday evening for the Arizona Accordion Club. They had several
of their members perform throughout the evening and they all did a
superb job. One of the nicest things we found out about is that
they have a youth program at the accordion club where they teach
kids (primarily under 20 years old) how to play accordion, and
they provide them with student accordions. They are always
looking for donations of accordions so they can continue to expand
this program, so if you have one setting around that you would
like to get rid of, please contact me and I (Ted) will get in
touch with them and figure out how to get them the instruments.
We must keep pushing to keep youth involved in our music so we can
ensure many more years of polka music, and this kind of program
does just that.
We’d like to
share a few more upcoming events with you before we close out this
update:
Bands for the
Hamler Summerfest, held the last weekend in July in Hamler, OH
have been finalized and include the following bands: Walt
Groller, Barefoot Becky, Hank Haller, The Party Time Reunion Band,
an “All New High School Honors Polka Band” and Squeezebox. We’ll
have more details in our next column about ‘The Granddaddy Of ‘Em
All”, the Hamler Summerfest.
Squeezebox and
Herzog Tours are running a trip to Germany September 21-30, 2010.
Join Ted and Mollie on a 9 Day Tour of Germany and Austria! Visit
the world-famous Munich Oktoberfest and optional Passion Play in
Oberammergau! This trip starts at $2,350 per person based on
double occupancy plus taxes. For more info or to reserve a spot,
contact Ted Lange at 419-966-3530 or Teresa Herzog at 989-652-8189
asap for there are limited spots available or
click here to view the trip flyer in a new window.
Also, in January
2011, Squeezebox will be joining Gary’s Ridgeland Dutchmen and
Barefoot Becky for a 7 day
Caribbean cruise. For more info, contact Ted, Gary or Becky, and we will be
happy to get you a brochure or
CLICK HERE to open a new window with the cruise flyer. |
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OUR LATEST CD IS AVAILABLE
ONLINE! |
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We're proud to
announce our new CD entitled "Freshly Squeezed" is available!
This new CD features 20 songs, over an hour of music, vocals in
English, Czech, Polish and
German, PLUS Mollie on Button Box, and a mix of musical stylings
sure to please everyone! This is our second recording to
date and contains 20 songs including 14 polkas, 2 waltzes, and 4
fox-trots/two steps with vocals by Ted, Mollie and Dave!
So far, we've
received great reviews by fans, DJ's and other musicians that have
already gotten their copies. So far, the crowd favorites
seem to be the following: "Two People In Love", "Cowboy's
Sweetheart", "Till I Waltz Again With You", "The Johnny Cash
Medley" and "I Just Don't Look Good Naked Anymore". In
addition to the new recording, we also have a new tee shirt
available to match the new CD!
Get your copy of the CD and all of our merchandise today by
clicking here! |
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MOLLIE IS NAMED 2008
USPA FEMALE VOCALIST OF THE YEAR |
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Congratulations are in
order for our very own Mollie B, who was named the 2008 Female
Vocalist of the Year by the United States Polka Association! Nominees
are voted upon by members of the USPA, and the winner receives their
awards at the Annual USPA Convention and Festival, which will be held
in Cleveland, OH on Memorial Day weekend, 2009. CONGRATULATIONS,
MOLLIE!! |
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Squeezebox Apparel Now Available Online!!
Click Here For Details! |
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AAA |
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Preparing for our second recording & expanding our schedule!
Bring SQUEEZEBOX To a Town Near You!
Over the next couple
months, SQUEEZEBOX will be hard at work once again in the studio,
working on our SECOND recording, which at this point will be called
"Freshly Squeezed."
Stay on the lookout for this much anticipated release from SQUEEZEBOX!
ALSO, WE'RE STILL LOOKING TO ADD SOME MORE DATES
TO OUR SCHEDULE! If you know of a festival or event in your area
that is looking for live music, please feel free to pass along our
contact info! We welcome any opportunity to perform in new areas
and new venues! Click HERE for our
contact information! |
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SQUEEZEBOX Announces release
of "SQUEEZE ME"
SQUEEZEBOX is proud to
announce the release of their debut recording, entitled "Squeeze Me"!
This new recording has a wide of variety of music, including 8 Polkas,
2 Waltzes, and 6 foxtrots/two-steps.
CLICK HERE to visit our recordings page, where you can download
samples of the songs and place your order for your own copy! |
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SQUEEZEBOX
is a live band, based in NW Ohio, that specializes in multiple genres of
music including polkas, waltzes, fox-trots, 2-steps, big band, swing,
square dances, and figure dances. With over 60 years combined
experience between the core members of the band, we're able to accommodate
nearly everyone's requests at our performances, and strive to please
everybody in attendance, both on and off the dance floor! With our diverse play list and solid
vocals in English,
Czech, German, and Polish, we are able to adapt to any venue, ranging from
town festivals, polka festivals, German festivals and Oktoberfests to
weddings, anniversary parties, church festivals and music festivals. |
SQUEEZEBOX began originally
in the late 1990's under a different name, known at that time as "The
Bratwurst Boys", which was a part time spin-off band consisting of members
from the Grammy Nominated "Toledo Polkamotion." However, as the band
and members evolved through the years, and we continually added new
material to our play list, it was evident that the name we were using
unfortunately had us pigeon-holed as a "polka only" band.... We can
most certainly play polkas and we love to play polkas.... AND MUCH
MORE THAN JUST POLKAS.... hence, the name change.
SQUEEZEBOX is made up of
three solid musicians with extensive backgrounds in the performing field:
Ted Lange, Mollie Busta, and Dave Burner. Check back soon to be able to
check out everyone's biography once that information has been added to the
site! |
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