The Beach Boys (Or not?) (1963)
The Beach Boys likely did NOT play the September 6 Trocadero show The September 6, 1963 “Back to School Dance” at Elitch Gardens’ Trocadero Ballroom was advertised with the Beach […]
Doris Day (1945)
Long before she was America’s sweetheart on the silver screen, Doris Day was a big band vocalist working the one-nighters — and that circuit ran right through Denver’s own Trocadero […]
Stan Kenton (1948)
Few orchestra leaders represented the changing face of postwar American big band music more dramatically than Stan Kenton. While many of his contemporaries remained rooted in traditional swing, Kenton continually […]
Lawrence Welk (1930s)
Lawrence Welk rose from an isolated North Dakota farm to become one of the most recognizable bandleaders and television personalities of the twentieth century. Born near Strasburg, North Dakota, in […]
Gene Krupa (1935)
Gene Krupa did more than become one of the most famous drummers of the swing era—he transformed the public image of the drummer. Born Eugene Bertram Krupa in Chicago on […]
Guy Lombardo (1930s)
Few orchestra leaders became as closely identified with elegant ballroom dancing as Guy Lombardo. Born Gaetano Alberto “Guy” Lombardo in London, Ontario, in 1902, he and his brothers formed the […]
Jimmy Dorsey
James Francis “Jimmy” Dorsey (1904–1957) was one of the defining musical figures of the Swing Era. A gifted clarinetist, alto saxophonist, composer, arranger, and bandleader, Dorsey helped shape the sound […]
Tommy Dorsey (1940)
Thomas Francis “Tommy” Dorsey Jr. was born November 19, 1905, in Mahanoy Plane, Pennsylvania, the son of a bandleader who taught him trumpet before he switched permanently to trombone. Alongside […]
Les Brown (1945)
Where Benny Goodman’s band came through Denver once, played a rough house, and moved on, Les Brown’s outfit came back again and again. Over parts of two decades, the Trocadero […]
Benny Goodman (1935)
Somewhere in the middle of a cross-country tour that would soon make him the “King of Swing,” Benny Goodman’s orchestra pulled its cars into Denver and set up on the […]