The holiday season brings with it so many different things. For those that live in the north or places with high elevation, snow and cold weather are just as normal as the rush for door busters on Black Friday. Salvation Army bell ringers are posted at every grocery and department store. Egg nog and tacky sweaters find their way into people's lives once again.
Through all of the constants that seem to represent the holidays, there is one that trumps them all – music.
Not only do radio and television light up with the sounds of the holidays, but halls all over the country fill up quickly with musical notes from those that take their passion for the holidays, music and live performance to churches, auditoriums and theaters so people can experience the holiday vibe live.
One musician who is looking to infuse the themes of musicality, history and fun into a non-stop festival dedicated to the holidays is John Tesh.
Tesh, who is known for so many different lines of work in the entertainment industry, will be in Milwaukee at the Milwaukee Theatre to present his show "Big Band Christmas Live," which he feels is a reinvigoration to the string of Christmas shows he's done in the past, mainly because they completely reinvented themselves on this one.
"This is a brand new show, actually. I mean, we've done a Christmas show for many years but we sort of tore up the playbook on this one and decided we were going to go back and make it like a 1920s show. I was in a kind of jazz band when I was in junior high school, in high school I played trumpet, and so that kind of music was what I was used to. When we were trying to figure out what to do, my music director, who has been my friend for 25 years, said, 'Why don't you go back to your roots and let's do a show that has some history to it?'"
So far, according to Tesh, the show has acted as a freshly turned-on light bulb for kids that have never experienced a live show that was big band instead of a DJ.
"It's pretty amazing because, you know, people who are 65 or 70 years old know what's going on – even 50. But, when you see kids who are 12 or 15 or even 5 years old, they've never heard music like this. It's new for them."
The downside of putting together such a large production with a host of high-class musicians is of course the cost, as Tesh points out, but the satisfaction of stirring emotions that hopefully start a conversation that will carry over from the venue to the car to the home is worth the diminished profit.
"The most exciting thing is watching the emotional element. When you go to a show, whether it's something like Bocelli or Riverdance, there's something emotional that's connected to that, especially if you have one of these songs that connects to a part of your life, whether it's a Christmas carol that you grew up with or it's a sound that makes you remember the '40s or '50s or '30s. We never come into a show and do 15 songs and move on. We're talking about my Christmas memories. You know, that kind of old-school Christmas when Santa didn't have email."
Tesh's favorite childhood memory of Christmas and the holidays is of his time spent in the church and caroling – the latter, he jokes, they did to make a little spare change.
"My favorite memory when I was a kid was always music. We used to go around, three of us, from house to house and play Christmas carols at people's houses on Christmas Eve trying to make money."
The musician also has his own favorite Christmas tune, a song that speaks to him on the most basic level.
"'I'll Be Home For Christmas.' I love that song. 'I'll be home for Christmas, you can count on me. Please have snow and mistletoe and presents by the tree.' I love that because I spent so much of my life traveling, bouncing around from station to station – radio and television – and living in Europe for 12 years. I think that we get so wrapped up in stuff and we're having our electronic conversations with everybody that you certainly realize that when you stop and go home for Christmas it's a powerful thing for you and your family. It definitely speaks volumes to our military who are spending Christmas without their loved ones."
The quality of the players that he's brought along with him for his big band-style shows is strong, as many of them used to gig with swing king Brian Setzer, which also leads them and the show to be more loose and fun.
"They're not only great musicians, the horn section especially, but they're also very goofy. I think that's what a lot of people mention when they come to see one of our shows, whether it's the mainstream show or it's the Christmas show. I think part of that is just realizing that it's not only a great gift but a great responsibility to have people who actually paid money to see you, and so we always make sure that we engage the audience and get people on stage. There's always people dancing at our show – whether there's room for it or not."
Tesh reiterates that this show is a show for adults, kids, families and anybody else who is looking to have a fun experience while being nudged down their own personal memory lane.
"The one thing that I would say is this is definitely a show to bring kids to, because you'll have a conversation after the show and we're very big on that. It might be a conversation about what life was like when you were celebrating Christmas. What is a trombone? What is the history of this music? It's really a chance to go back and get a piece of history through music."
Born in Milwaukee and raised in the Milwaukee suburb of Brown Deer, Concordia University Wisconsin alumnus Poppe has spent the majority of his life in or around the city and county of Milwaukee.
As an advocate of Milwaukee's hip-hop community Poppe began popular local music blog Milwaukee UP in March 2010. Check out the archived entries here.
Though heavy on the hip-hop, Poppe writes about other genres of music and occasionally about food, culture or sports, and is always ready to show his pride in Milwaukee and Wisconsin.
