The Misfits will be featured at this week’s St. Joseph Municipal Band Concerts.

Director of the St. Joseph Municipal Band, Dr. Donald Moely, indicated the band concerts scheduled for Sunday, July 28 will highlight "The Misfits,:" the humorous singing group of the St. Joseph area. Also featured will be a French horn solo by long time band member Stacie Detgen, and the band accompaniment will be conducted by Stacie’s mother, Dixie Detgen 46 year oboe member of the band.

The concert begins with ‘the March King" John Philip Sousa’s "The Diplomat," followed by featuring Stacie Detgen, principal French horn player in the band in "Sonatina" by Antonin Dvorak. Dr. Moely said this represents a family event in that Dixie Detgen, mother, 46 year veteran of the band will conduct the band in accompanying her daughter, Stacie Detgen in the featured French horn solo.

STACIE DETGEN, has been a member of the St. Joe Municipal Band for 21 years and is in her 13th year of teaching instrumental music education and her 8th year at Charlotte Junior High School. She is a native of Buchanan, and began playing the French Horn in 5th grade. Stacie has a Bachelors Degree from Michigan State University and a Master of Music Education degree from VanderCook College of Music in Chicago. Ms. Detgen has been a member of the Greater Lansing Symphony Orchestra, the Lansing Concert Band, the Meridian Community Band, the Capitol Area Brass Quintet, the Charlotte Lawrence Avenue Methodist Church orchestra and brass choir.

DIXIE DETGEN retired after teaching band for 29 years in the Buchanan Community Schools. She currently teaches instrumental music in a private school, lessons and sectionals at Lakeshore Middle School, is the oboe instructor in the Salvation Army Arts and Education Program, plays organ and directs the choir at her church, plays oboe with the Southhold Wind Ensemble (South Bend, IN) and the St. Joseph Municipal Band (completing her 46th year) and owns her own business called Detgen Seminars and Clinics, working with bands and directors throughout the state. She holds memberships in MENC, where she is a nationally registered teacher, ASBDA, serving on the Foundation Board, NBA, IDRS, MSBOA, AF of M, S.A.I. and was nominated to Who’s Who Among America’s Teachers in 1992. She was also the MSBOA Band Teacher of the Year in 1996.

The program continues with a unique arrangement of a well known hymn with a patriotic flavor, "God of our Fathers,: arrangement by Claude T. Smith.

Left to right: Nick Rose, Harry Sherwood, Warren Hahn, Bill Carney and John Bednar

Special Entertainment for the concerts this week will be "The Misfit." THE MISFITS is a comedy chorus directed by Joan Nozicka. This group of 30 recreational singers was formed in May of 1995 with 12 singers. Their objectives are to enjoy music and to entertain. This was to be done at local nursing homes to help "cheer-up" their residents. To accomplish this, they decided to do musical comedy with appropriate comical costumes. Each member designs and creates their own costume. This year their theme is ‘our town." This tells the audience musically about the local area. (The area serviced by the St. Joseph/Lincoln Senior Center.. Home base of the group). Now in their eighth year, they have performed over 400 programs before various groups and organizations. Their travels have taken them to parts of Southwestern Michigan as well as Northern Indiana. In 1997 they traveled to Branson, Missouri, for a performance. Nozicka, now retired, had taught piano and organ privately for many years. With her musical background, she is able to select and arrange the music that the group performs. She pre-records the accompanying music that is used for each performance.

The Misfits will perform "Back to Michigan," "Ain’t She Sweet," "Harbor Lights," "School songs," "Five Foot Two," and "Strike Up the Band." Personnel consists of: Janet Bednar, Mildred Brown, Millie Carney, Delores Frantz, Esther Hahne, Polly Jud, Joanne Parrish, Josephine Perry, Iila Roethel, Cathy Sherwood, Alice Williams, Very Zwar, Louis Arent, John Bednar, Betty Bohm, Bill Carney, Warren Hahn, Charles Lillie, Peggy Platts, Nick Rose, Harry Sherwood, Scott Sherwood, Nancy Campau, Darlene Freer, Imelda Knowles, Fran Ray, Leona Rose, Betty Ross, Betty Rothenberg.

The band continues with "The Whippet" march by Henry Fillmore, Fantasy for Band by Frank Erickson and concludes the concert with what many consider to be one Sousa’s best marches "The Gallant Seventh."

The concerts will be at 3:30 and 7:30 p.m., at the John E. N. Howard Band Shell across from the Whitcomb in downtown St. Joseph.