Colleen Raye is an accomplished singer, actress and entertainer. A native of Wisconsin, Colleen began her career at the young age of 15 and has been enchanting audiences ever since. Her rich, sultry, alto voice and charismatic personality combine to make each performance a complete experience of world class vocals and entertainment. Whether singing with Big Band Jazz, intimate vocals and piano, or full-out show tunes, Colleen has a talent that makes all of them shine. Coupled with a touch of her off beat humor, you never know quite what to expect from this engaging artist.
Colleen began singing at age 15 with her brother’s band “The Tradewinds,then in college with The Lovell Ives Big Band and The Peter Polzak Jazz Trio as well as a classical soloist in choral works and operettas at UW River Falls.
After winning the Horace Heidt Jr Talent Contest at age 19, Colleen toured in the musical show group, “Steve Grimm and Colleen Raye”. Colleen and Steve married and traveled across the country performing in Atlantic City, Las Vegas, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and all across the country in various venues from fairs and festivals to casinos and performing arts centers. They had 4 children, all of them currently in show business.
Colleen began her solo career 20 years ago and has since starred in and produced several shows including “The Girl Singers of the Hit Parade”, “A Musical Tribute to Patsy Cline”, “Girl Singers Sirens of the 60s”, and “The Girl Singer Christmas Show,” “Belting Babes of Broadway,”as well as “An Evening At The Cabaret,” “Sinatra and Company – Music From The Rat Pack Era,” and “That Holiday Feeling.”
Known to all as “Skip”, Layton James retired after 42 seasons as Principal Keyboardist for the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra. He studied piano with Tsuya Matsuki in New York City from age 5-17. Following graduation from The College of Wooster in music and religion, in 1963, he studied musicology under Donald Grout at Cornell University, and later pursued doctoral studies at Stanford University. He has found his true calling to be performance, conducting, and composition. A noted pianist, he was awarded the status of Steinway Artist in 2009. A famous continuo harpsichordist, James built the instruments he played with the SPCO and other groups. As a composer, he has always felt very comfortable in the Baroque style, and has produced several cantatas, concertos and other works commissioned by the SPCO, his church, and his musical colleagues. Most recently, his “Suite in E-minor” for unaccompanied flute has had a wide following. His interpretations of Handel can be heard in the acclaimed recording of the “Complete Flute Sonatas” with Julia Bogorad and Charles Ullery. He has wide experience in arranging for instruments and voices, and is an expert orchestrator. He recently arranged Fauré’s “Cantique de Jean Racine” for chorus and orchestra, performed at the premier concert of the Maui Chamber Orchestra. Other musicians frequently call on Mr. James to compose original cadenzas for classical concertos, most recently the violinist Chio-Liang Lin He instituted the pre-concert lectures before SPCO concerts known as “Fanfares,” and led them for thirty years. He was the featured harpsichordist on “Messiah” recordings with Robert Shaw and the Atlanta Symphony. Mr. James was a member of the chamber group “The Blue Baroque Band” which appeared at the Phipps in 2012, and has appeared as a pianist two other times at that venue. He has been Music Director and Organist at Bethel Lutheran Church in Hudson, for the past 18 years, where he conducts the 30-voice Bethel Chorale. He is a faculty member at UW River Falls, as a lecturer in harpsichord. He has recently been involved in several recording projects. He was harpsichordist/musicologist for the first American recording of Zelenka’s “Chamber Sonatas”, produced by Crystal Records, and made a DVD conducting Handel’s “Messiah” with the Great Lakes Chamber Orchestra and Chorus, in Petoskey, Michigan. He is currently recording a CD with trumpet player Mel Olson. He played keyboards for two seasons with Music in the Mountains, a festival in Durango, CO. He was both performer and arranger of music of Rameau for the Bach Dancing and Dynamite Society of Madison, WI in 2012. He has appeared as harpsichordist this past summer in a concert at the Lakes Music Festival in Brainerd, MN; and the following week at a similar festival in Alexandria. He collaborates with Metropolitan Opera mezzo Margaret Jane Wray, with whom he has concertized in the Twin Cities and locally. This past season, Mr. James conducted Handel’s “Messiah,” a joint project of his church and the Phipps Center, on April 9. as well as leading the St. Croix Valley Symphony in two performances. He will appear as harpsichordist with flautist Adam Kuenzel at a benefit concert on October 8th. Married to Linda James, and ‘father’ to two dogs, he roots for the Green Bay Packers, and enjoys cooking and fishing.
Tina James has been freelancing on oboe and English horn for over twenty-five years, having landed her first gig as a soloist in a pilot film score at the age of sixteen. Currently on faculty at the University of Wisconsin-River Falls, she has also served on music faculties at both Weber State University and St. Cloud State University. Previous performance engagements have included the Utah Symphony Orchestra, VocalEssence, Ballet West, Colors of the Baroque, Sinfonia da Camera, the Duluth-Superior Symphony Orchestra and the Champaign-Urbana Symphony Orchestra. Tina has recorded with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, The Minnesota Opera and has played for several feature film scores. You may have heard her locally with Mannheim Steamroller, Loyce Houlton’s Nutcracker and in the pit orchestra at the Orpheum for Broadway Across America (Wicked, Mary Poppins, My Fair Lady). These days, however, you’ll find her primarily in her home studio where she mentors forty of the most fun and talented oboe and piano students around or making great musical memories with her friends and colleagues in the St. Croix Valley Symphony Orchestra.
Russia’s native violinist Natalia Moiseeva holds BM 
and MM degrees in Violin Performance from the Moscow State Tchaikovsky Conservatory in Russia where she studied with Sergey Girshenko, and a DMA degree in Violin Performance from the University of Minnesota. She is a prizewinner of international and local competitions including National Youth Competitions (Russia) and University of Minnesota School of Music Concerto Competition. Natalia has appeared as a soloist with orchestras both in the United States and Europe. An avid chamber music player, she performs regularly in the Twin Cities Area as well as abroad collaborating with the members of Minnesota Orchestra and St. Paul Chamber Orchestra. Natalia is a regular guest artist with “ The Musical Offering” Twin Cities Premier Chamber Ensemble. She was a part of the State Symphony Orchestra of Russia named after Evgeny Svetlanov for five years before moving to the United States. Natalia is an assistant concertmaster of the Minnesota Opera orchestra and often performs with the Minnesota Orchestra. Currently she teaches Applied Violin at the University of Wisconsin-River Falls.
Peter Sheppard Skærved is the dedicatee of well over 200 works for solo violin, by composers such as George Rochberg, Judith Weir, Michael Finnissy, and Hans Werner Henze. He regularly appears as soloists in over 
30 countries. His discography is extensive, ranging from cycles of sonatas by Beethoven and Telemann, the complete quartets of David Matthews, Michael Tippett, and cycles of concerti from Haydn to Henze.
He has won awards from the BBC Music Magazine, been nominated for a Gramophone Award, as well as a GRAMMY for a concerto recording in 2007. He records for NMC, Chandos, Naxos, Metier and Toccata. Director of an acclaimed series of concerts at Wiltons Music Hall in London, Peter Sheppard Skærved is the founder and leader of the Kreutzer Quartet and the Munich-based Ensemble Triolog. He regularly appears as director and soloist with ensembles such as the Zagreb Soloists and Athelas Sinfonietta Copenhagen.
Peter Sheppard Skærved is the only British violinist to have been invited to play on Paganini’s violin il Cannone more than once (five times in particular) and he regularly gives recitals on the prestigious collection of historic instruments at the Library of Congress, Washington. He is also acclaimed for his collaborative work with museums, working regularly with the British Museum, National Portrait Gallery, Tate Galleries, Victoria and Albert Museum and worldwide. He plays on a 1698 Stradivari owned by Joseph Joachim from the collections of the Royal Academy of Music, where he is the Fellow of Performance Studies.
Anthony Kearns from County Wexford began his career in Dublin in 1993 with the renowned singing teacher Veronica Dunne. A multiple award winner at the Dublin Feis Ceoil , He quickly garnered attention.
One of his earliest highlights of his career was the honour of performing the tribute songs for the All Ireland finals of 1996 in which his native country took the hurling title .
He took American television audience by storm in 1999 as a member of the wildly-popular PBS super-group, The Irish Tenors which he continues to tour with twice a year. His international solo career includes high-profile celebrity engagements, television appearances, concert tours, and collaborations with the finest orchestras, including the Boston Pops, the Chicagoland Pops, Grand Rapids (MI) Pops, and the National Symphony Orchestra at the National Memorial Day Concert in the USA.
Mr. Kearns made his official U.S. Grand Opera debut as the tenor in the role of “Edgardo” in Gaetano Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor with Opera Naples [Florida]. Since then, he has starred as: “Don José” in the Dun Laoghaire/ Rathdown Glasthule Opera Company’s production of Georges Bizet’s Carmen; the tenor with the Royal Dublin Society in The Lily of Killarney (part of "The Irish Ring" trilogy) which toured North America; the tenor role of “Don Ottavio,” in Mozart’s Don Giovanni at the Lismore Music Festival; and “Alfred” in a concert-staged performance of Johann Strauss’ operetta, Die Fledermaus by the Emerald City [Steamboat Springs, CO, USA] Opera. Upon moving to the U.S., Kearns returned to Opera Naples as the tenor in Charles Gounod’s Faust, a role he also performed with Opera Ireland (nominated for best production in the Irish Times Theater Awards). Other roles include “Fenton” in Giuseppe Verdi’s Falstaff (in Montepulciano, Italy) and “Nemorino” in Donizetti’s most performed opera, L’elisir d’amore, with Gulfshore Opera in Naples, FL in May of 2016 and most recently with Lismore Opera Festival Co Waterford Ireland in June 2017 .
Excerpt from www.the-wagner-tuba.com:
“The first time that I ever heard the Wagner Tuba was on the radio when I was driving home from high school. It was a pop tune called “Classical Gas” by Mason Williams that was arranged by Mike Post. The recordings by the Los Angeles Horn Club gave a name to the sound that I heard on “Classical Gas”. I would occasionally come across references or recordings that would include Wagner Tubas, but was never able to get my hands on one.”
“It was a long time before I was able to actually see and play a Wagner Tuba. When I found out that there was an affordable instrument available I discovered that a member of the Twin Cities Horn Club owned one of the Chinese built Wagner Tubas. He let me try his out, and shortly after that I bought one for myself.”
“After I had my own Wagner Tuba I started to look for recordings of the Wagner Tuba and for pieces written for the tuba. I came across a recording of Edel Rhapsody On YouTube. I loved the way that Stephen Caudel’s piece featured the sound of the Wagner Tuba. I ordered a copy of Edel Rhapsody with piano accompaniment. I liked it so much that I gave a copy of the recording to the SCVSO director and now it is on the SCVSO program for the October 20 concert. The Edel Rhapsody is fun to play and really features the sound of the Wagner Tuba.”
Denny mentions two important horn clubs which helped shape his interest in the Wagner tuba. Here are some links for those interested in reading further: Los Angeles Horn Club and Twin Cities Horn Club.
