COUNTRY
Serving Marine on St. Croix, Scandia, May Township
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 7, 2016 VOL. 33 NO. 32 www.countrymessenger.com $.75
MARINE'S GREEN STEP: City builds recycling, composting, and trash enclosure. PAGE 7
Local band’s new release
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The Riverside Swing Band, which has been playing at the Brookside for almost a decade, released a Christmas album the weekend after Thanksgiving.
BY JESSICA ANDERSON INTERIM EDITOR
The many people who have been to hear bands play at the Brookside Bar and Grill in Marine will likely have heard of the Riverside Swing Band. It’s a special time for the band because they’ve recently released their first Christmas album. Greig Tennis, of Stillwater, helped found the group in 2007. He plays upright base in the band and his son Kyle, who lives in Marine with his wife Sara, a photographer, plays guitar and does vocals. The other members
are Dave Strong who plays the saxophone, flute, and sings, Gus Lindquist, trumpet and vocals, Alan Lecher, trombone and vocals, and Tyler Anderson on drums. The band’s home base is the Twin Cities, having played “at hundreds of festivals, bars, casinos, weddings, swing dances, parties, and even funerals,” according to Kyle. The idea for a Christmas album originated around three years ago at the band’s monthly swing dance in Minneapolis at which people frequently requested holiday music. “With the success of our Christmas shows,
we decided to record a handful of songs, including a few classics, a couple originals, and our swing version of The Nutcracker Suite. We decided to record six songs on this album, with the idea that we’d release additional Christmas albums in the coming years. The band spent the spring preparing the music, we recorded it this summer, had it pressed in the fall, and we released it the weekend after Thanksgiving,” Kyle explained. The band recorded this album, their fourth, at the Pearl
SEE GIFTS, PAGE 2
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Handcrafted wooden products, such as these colorful bird sculptures, can make great one-of-a-kind Christmas gifts while helping preserve the environment.
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A new kind of Christmas tree BY JESSICA ANDERSON INTERIM EDITOR
SEE BAND, PAGE 2
Looking for green gifts? Think wood For holiday gift ideas, consider a locally made gift created from trees harvested in Minnesota. Wooden toys, handcrafts and keepsakes are a great green gift option. Wood is a renewable resource that is natural, nontoxic and eco-friendly. “Wood products are great green gifts for both kids and adults,” said Kristen Bergstrand, DNR utilization and marketing program coordinator. “Uniquely hand-crafted and individually customized wooden gifts are a wonderful option for a person who has everything.” Wooden blocks, rocking chairs or horses, puzzles, rattles, picture frames and artisan bowls or wood crafts are unique items that are often passed down to future generations as
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Andy Campeau's seven-foot-tall Christmas tree, made of stacked logs, is on display at the Security State Bank of Marine.
PUBLIC NOTICES 651-433-3845 editor@countrymessenger.com
This year the Security State Bank of Marine is home to a unique and beautiful art piece created by Andy Campeau, a resident of Marine. Recently retired from the Washington County Public Works department, Campeau constructed an approximately seven foot tall Christmas tree out of stacked logs. “It took me a couple of days to figure it out,” he said. Campeau drilled holes in the center of each log and stacked them on a tall umbrella stand, long logs on the bottom and gradually getting shorter as the height increased. Then the logs were turned at different angles to give the entire structure the shape of a pine tree. Campeau stated that he had gotten the idea from a similar, smaller, version he had seen outside a shop in Venice, Italy. The logs all came from buckthorn trees Campeau pulled from his yard seven years ago, he then began the project. Not wanting to waste the logs met with a long time fascination and artistic interest with trees to create this tree. “It’s a hard, dense, wood. Very pretty,” Campeau said of buckthorn, an invasive species. “Why not try to make something out of it?” Campeau and partner Ron Sorenson, an interior designer who did the redecoration of Marine’s bank, have an impressive history of creating unique and beautiful Christmas trees. “Our trees are usually about 16 feet high,” stated Campeau. SEE CAMPEAU, PAGE 2
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