Most local bands number their existence in a few years or at most, a few decades. The Milwaukee Mandolin Orchestra (MMO) tops everyone as they amble into their 119th year. Tracing their origins to 1900, MMO is older even than the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra or the Florentine Opera.
With such longevity, they have as much business as any area musicians to organize a concert called “Music That Made Milwaukee Famous.” The evening at the South Milwaukee Performing Arts Center will include guest performances by Robin Pluer, Misha Litvin and Stas Venglevski.
Although the mandolin now usually brings to mind bluegrass or country roots, the instrument was popularized in many American cities before the start of the 20th century by Italian and other European immigrants. Orchestras consisting of mandolinists (accompanied sometimes by guitar or violin) were common and several were established in Milwaukee around the same time as MMO. Their repertoire was pop music in the era when most middle-class homes had a piano in the parlor; when sheet music sales determined the hit parade and sound recordings were novel and technically crude.
“You could say that the mandolin is having a rebirth in the U.S.,” says Katy Vandenberg, MMO’s assistant director, referring to several new mandolin orchestras that have formed elsewhere in recent years. “Attending the annual Classical Mandolin Society of America conventions, we see that other orchestras are gaining members as mandolin orchestras perform more and become more prevalent in musical settings. Getting the word out is mainly through social media, word of mouth, attracting musicians who play similar instruments like cellists (for mandocello) or violinists or even by playing in local bars or coffee shops.”
As current pop music, MMO and its peers in other cities pose no threat to Beyoncé or Bruno Mars. Besides the charming tonalities of their chosen instrument, MMO serves dual purposes as a living archive of popular songs circa 1900—a time when Milwaukee was already an important center for music publishing—and a vehicle for exploring the instrument’s potential in classical music. Recent years have seen MMO perform arrangements of Johann Sebastian Bach, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Antonio Vivaldi.
For “Music That Made Milwaukee Famous.” Robin Pluer, best known as the Bastille Days chanteuse and for performing with the R&B Cadets, will sing a song that likely figured in MMO’s original repertoire, Stephen Foster’s lovely “Beautiful Dreamer,” along with a pair of tunes from the early 20th century, “Pennies From Heaven” and “Who’s That Knockin’ On My Door?” Originally from Belarus, Milwaukee musician Misha Litvin plays domra, a Russian style mandolin, and Stas Venglevski, originally from nearby Moldova, plays bayan, a Russian accordion. Their contributions to the concert will “be a surprise for the orchestra” as well as the audience, according to Vandenberg. The two musicians will perform as a duo for 30 minutes and each will join MMO for one number.
“Our biggest news is that this July we’ll be performing two concerts in Japan,” Vandenberg says, in conjunction with a pair of Japanese mandolin orchestras whose ranks reach nearly 100 members. MMO maintains a regular schedule in Milwaukee with shows at Lakefront Festival of the Arts, the Sarah Chudnow Community Center and Lyndon Sculpture Gardens, and they have ventured out to Madison and Chicago. Several MMO members have been with the orchestra for a quarter century. “We have gained a few members in the last year and a couple of them are younger musicians,” Vandenberg adds. “Most, if not all, American mandolin orchestras have the same problem: attracting young musicians. There are a couple of programs in the U.S. that are teaching young children the mandolin in after school programs called Mando for Kids. We don’t have any in this area yet, but we are seeing that, over the years, many kids are retaining the mandolin as the instrument of choice.”
Music That Made Milwaukee Famous takes place at 7:00 p.m. on Saturday, Jan. 26, at the South Milwaukee Performing Arts Center, 901 15th Ave. For tickets and more information, visit southmilwaukeepac.org or call 414-766-5049.
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