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The history of the Westshoremen


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Thinking about Vinnie (and the rest of the "Sailorettes" crew as Denise Shade reminded me) I remember spring and summer of 79 with him, Mikey Bordinski and Greg Lutz (well and Donnie Sweger) and hanging out at corps camp. Those guys basically taught me how to (and how not to) drink beer! Vinnie was always "don't drink any more, you're going to puke if you don't stop" and for the most part I didn't get sick! :thumbup:

Corps camp that year, I can't comment on since there were a few things that probably shouldn't be mentioned in a public forum :blink:

But we had fun that year!!! RIP Vinnie!

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Dave Krauss posted on FB this morning that Vinnie Colletti passed away.

Vinnie was drum instructor Ric Colletti's brother. Vinnie played snare in 78-79.

Haven't seen an obit posted anywhere, yet.

Dad called me, he got an email from the Rebels. Apparently he had been ill for a while.

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Ouch.... trying to remember Vinnie but 78-79 I dind't know too many new people as was in college so missed a lot of social time before summer started. Man a pair of people during that time in about two weeks with Vinnie and Brian Alexander....

edit: can one of you FBers post about Brian if it isn't already in. Tried getting on Kris FB account (first time in 3 months) and so much #### came up I gave up trying to find anything useful.

Brian is on the FB page

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Did anyone find an obituary for Vinnie, yet?

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no, and just Mike Johnson, sop in the mid 70's passed away

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Interesting thoughts after reading of Vinnie's demise and thinking back on those years....I remembered that 1979 was my "formative" year in "real" drum corps (Yeah, I spent 1978 in Hershey, but 1979 was my first authentic taste of competitive drum corps)

Some of the things I remember (and the tune keeps rolling through my brain) was the "Anything Goes" tune that we marched our street time to...back in THOSE days, when keyboard players actually carried them and marched, the street beats had tunes...I'm not sure where ours came from, but I remember the first few practices (where I played tenors, Ric (Coletti) saw that I played them in Hershey, and figured he'd give me a shot... I WASN'T ready) and we played a street beat that wasn't what we ended up using, but it was to the tune of the Popeye "hornpipe" and was pretty intense...I finally got it, and then was then handed the music to Granada Smoothie, and pretty much figured that I was destined to play something else that year, try as Lauren might too help me learn it... I talked to Ric, and said that maybe I should go to something else, and Rickie Lee talked me into timpani (after Randy Barry lobbied for me to play bass drum...I thought timpani would be more of a challenge) :tongue:

Anyway...for some reason, our street time changed, and when things really got rolling, Eddie Katrinic showed up, and added the "Anything Goes" tune to the street time we settled upon. Now back in those days, I wasn't really friends with Eddie, and pretty much only got to know Barb (rest her soul) Craig (who was a high school classmate of Ritchie Price's) and Randy after marching with them in later years. Eddie was one of those guys from the Maryland scene and Vinnie's crew. (and surprisingly, after hanging with Vinnie and Mikey that year, I didn't get to know Eddie very well) I DO know that the guy was pretty talented (as were the rest of our keyboard players) and was a hard hitter! (you could hear that xylophone for miles!) Hopefully Dave stops in and can fill in some blanks on Eddie. When I listen to 1979, you have to marvel at the talent in that drumline...we had a top notch snare line, an adequate tom line, a good bass line (and decent timp line...although I think THAT year the writing sucked, 1980 was MUCH better) and an exceptional keyboard section!

Listening to the 1979 show I remember things changing CONSTANTLY with some of the charts, as well as the many incarnations of our Sing Sing Sing drum solo. At the Forum, I remember Mikey B playing the "Gene Krupa tom tom part" on two bass drums (I wish I still had that cassette)(well if I do, I wish I could find it) and the drum solo being entirely different than what ended up on the field. I guess when it came down to it, and I'm sure I've mentioned this before, I didn't take a whole lot of stock (looking back) on that particular drum instructor, and figured that he was good at writing snare parts, and only fairly decent at writing everything else....but in 1979...what did I know? (and what do I know even to this day)

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79 SIB was on an album I think...I'll have to check at dads

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79 SIB was on an album I think...I'll have to check at dads

Need a copy of that. Remember the recording going on but can't remember if 78 or 79.

PS - Burning 1985 WSM at ICA Championships DVD for some folks, wanna trade?

PPSS - Dave Fisher already hit me up for 2013 Alumni.... said no but sure that's not the end of the arm twisting....

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Yeah 79 SIB was the recorded one, but we only get a little bit of "love" if I recall... I think Larry put more of the Naval Academy on it than anything else.

I have it, can't attest to the quality of it...not to mention the effectiveness of my turntable.

(and no track listings on the jacket)

Edited by Jaminbenb
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Yeah 79 SIB was the recorded one, but we only get a little bit of "love" if I recall... I think Larry put more of the Naval Academy on it than anything else.

I have it, can't attest to the quality of it...not to mention the effectiveness of my turntable.

(and no track listings on the jacket)

Have the Naval Acadey on vinyl somewehere. Studio recording that IIRC just sounds bland like any other studio recording of a corps. Maybe after I retire I'll get around to copying my vinyl to CDs. By then I probably won't be able to buy the needles.... :shutup:/>

Edited by JimF-LowBari
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