Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!

I had a solo gig last night in Medford Wisconsin at The Uncommon Ground, a little coffee shop where I played when I began a "music career" again in the early to mid 1990's while I was in my 40's. I hadn't been there in seven years, and playing there now, I had the time of my life! It was like a reunion with family. People have always been so good there, I didn't realize how important they are, the people that support you and love you. That's my thanks this year, as well as wonderful friends and family! Keep running into people that make you feel this way and your life will be full. My thanks to Jeff & Barb Sons-O'-Bee for letting me play for them; thanks to Sara for hospitality Wednesday night; and thanks to Paul for knockin' that microphone into my face ten years ago and makin' me part of this family!

    This has been a wild 2008 for The Delta Jets! First, with a new format - blues harp and drums! Dale Anderson used to play alone with drummer, MarkOnDrums, but this year when they went their separate ways and Joe Vanesky came in on the harp, this outfit went crazy! Most recently, in August, they received a standing ovation at the 5th Annual Marquette Area Blues Fest in Marquette Michigan, and sold more CD's than any other performers at the festival! And in September The Delta Jets made quite an impression on Friday night at The Olde Towne Blues Fest in Lansing Michigan where, playing the six o'clock spot on the South Stage, they garnered an audience of hundreds, were featured on the local news, and got the front page in the Lansing State Journal Saturday morning! The Jets went on the River Stage to do a workshop on Saturday afternoon. Dale and Joe do slide, historical blues and blues harmonica workshops along with their great performances on the main stages.
     David Will, the new man on the scene, plays the backbeat on an unusual drum kit, featuring a suitcase for bass drum. Singing through and old telephone mouthpiece, and playing resonator guitars and 60's Silvertones from the Sears catalog, Dale has the most interesting sound at any festival! Joe plays all harps, including chromatic (Imagine The Harmonicats from the Ed Sullivan Show!), and sings through his big Fender Bassman amp. No one misses a bass guitar when you hear this group. The Jets make 'em dance like nobody else.
     Festival experience includes The 2007 International Blues Challenge, Beale street, Memphis TN; Prairie Dog Blues Fest (3 years); Chicago Blues Tour 2008; Feelgood Festival 2005, 2006, 2007; Alpena Blues Fest 2008, Olde Town Blues Fest, Lansing MI 2008; Art Street, Green Bay WI; and many other small festivals in the Midwest. Dale has played at Chicagoland Ukulele Jam Festival, he is also a master on ukulele, which is featured on some of his recordings. Over forty years of playing and touring gives a certain experience, doesn't it? The band plays throughout Wisconsin, Michigan, Indiana, and Illinois. The favorite band for years at The Smoke Daddy club in Chicago, they play there monthly!
     Just play 'My Baby Blues' and 'Roll With It' ~ you'll hear the difference! Now is the time to feature The Delta Jets, a great band, at your festival! Working the main stage and doing guitar and  harmonica workshops, making a totally different sound than all the others, this three man band is a bargain at any price!

~ Applegren Entertainment ~

   Dale Anderson (slide guitar & vocals)  is joining Jody (Joe) Vanesky (harmonica & vocals) to re-form 'The Delta Jets'. This venture is something that both Joe and Dale have been contemplating for a while -- being longtime appreciators of the old time blues sound.  This music will draw upon early (pre-war) influences, including guitarists like Charlie Patton and Robert Johnson and harmonica players like Sonny Boy Williamson (both 1st & 2nd) and Jazz Gillum. Drummer Jonny Sunn will be working with the band at upbeat bar gigs!   

   Look for The Delta Jets soon in Green Bay and Northeastern Wisconsin! Jimmy Seas, IQ's Bar, & Revolutions!

   Dale Anderson & The Delta Jets must remain! Stevie DuPree & Travis Stephenson, The Delta Flyers from Texas & The Deep South weren't gonna be too happy about me using their name! There's already been some confusion at the Blues Festivals. I gotta stick with what and who I really am! Wow! The proverbial "hitting the fan!"

Delta Jets, The - Chairfactory Blues. If you've been around the Broadway district, particularly for the Wednesday Farmer's Market, you've probably heard Dale Anderson and the Delta Jets. Until very recently Mark Riggenbach, the drummer, was Kavarna's biscotti baker. This year they finally finished and released Chairfactory Blues, a great album of delta blues classics and Anderson originals. It's a wonderful record. If you see Dale or the Delta Jets, make sure to pick up the record.

    I am pleased to announce the news! The 'Chairfactory Blues' CD by The Delta Jets  is now for sale at CD Baby. You can listen to all the songs (or buy the CD) by clicking the CD picture or Buy The CD Now! icons on my front page. You might like some of the other cuts off the CD if you haven't heard them before! Please feel free to write a review on the album if you are familiar with 'Chairfactory' already. 

    Dale Anderson's solo albums from the 1990's, 'Victoria Smiles' and 'Parkridge Avenue' have now been produced in a double CD format for only $11.99! It is available at CD Baby! Twenty-two songs! Sixteen Dale A originals including Walk To Cana Island!

   A new CD is in the works with originals by Dale including Mister, Mister;  I'm Goin' Down (to the Penitentiary); and I've Had Enough; and an original Joe V instrumental titled Cat's A-Creepin'.

    I’ve been retired from the USPS just one week short of a year! There are some things that I can do now that I never had time for before. Today! Yes today, for the first time...  I won a game of solitaire (on the computer) on the first time through the deck. In one hand, do you believe it??!  I’ll play while waiting for www. screens to come up and before you know it I’m feverishly laying cards, brewing pots of coffee, clicking and dragging and clicking and dragging, ace after duce, queen after king, red upon black! It is an exciting time for me!!!

    I just can’t remember what I was looking up on the computer!?! Oh yeah, I was looking up the Shakespeare quote. I was right, it’s "aye, that’s the rub"! OOh, double excitement!

I have a few things I’d like to share with everyone on my birthday!

Today I will have three meals, cold pizza, a deluxe from GB Pizza Co. and coffee for breakfast; GB Pizza Co. tomato & fresh mushroom pizza reheated on the baking stone at 300 degrees for ten minutes along with 7Up and pomegranate juice (I have a cold); and tonight... JAKE’S (Pizza, that is, with beer)! This will be the first time in my 58 years that I’ve eaten pizza for all three meals! I must be in some sort of strange heaven... Mom would never have let me do this back on Parkridge Avenue!

My cold remedy for you all. Double up on vitamins E & C: take one Dayquil (softgel) and one aspirin, ibuprofen or acetaminophen, with water or juice (or milk) every four to six hours during the day; one Nyquist at bedtime (one part nighttime Nyquil and one part vodka, straight or on the rocks, instead of the full dose of Nyquil); and use peppermint candy and mild Ricola in equal dosages (you won’t get that Halls stomach ache but you’ll get thirsty, therefore you’ll drink more water and  juices, [7Up, good with too tart pomegranate]) Do not exceed more than 2400 mgs. per day intake of acetaminophen.

Thanks for your time...

Daley

To all my friends,

Concerning the death of Dan Fogelberg, December 16, 2007.

     Thirty years ago I was at Montgomery Wards, the new store out along the grassy hay fields of old Ashwaubenon Wisconsin, where now sits the expanse of modern-day shopping filled with traffic snarls, restaurants and suburbia. As was my usual, I was trying on and buying too bright blue, wide-ribbed corduroy pants, probably to match a new orange shirt. Such was the store promotion, I received a free LP record with a minimum purchase, and the music I chose was Dan Fogelberg's album 'Netherlands.' I was a musician and I was quite intrigued with the cover art and his music. The production was
so fine and the soaring harmonies were heavenly. I had never heard this sort
of a production before, and I wondered if this record was real! Why hadn't I
seen it or heard it before? Fogelberg had played acoustic 12-string guitars,
Leslie guitar, electric lead guitars, lap steel guitar, slide guitar,
acoustic guitars, electric rhythm guitars, electric Gretsch guitar, high
string guitar, piano, electric piano, pipe organ, organ, Arp synthesizers,
harpsichord, Arp string ensemble, finger cymbals, and sleigh bells. What's
more, he had written all songs and produced the record - and he was younger
than I, being twenty seven at the time myself.

     Dan Fogelberg continued to captivate me at the time. I bought 'The
Innocent age' album weeks after John Lennon's death. When I returned to playing

in the mid to late 80's, I bought a black Stratocaster in '87 and dreamed of
playing in a wedding band or something. I got hold of 'High Country Snows',
Fogelberg's bluegrass album. He did some historical-sounding story songs
like 'Sutter's Mill', a song about the discovery of gold and the movement to
the West that started me back to my Dylan, folk-type roots and my music history
interest.

     Well, it took until 1991 when I went to an open mic, The Songwriter's
Showcase, hosted by Chris Wood and attended by my friend, Dana Erlandson,
prepared with two poorly-written schlock songs that I had. "'Some Of My
Friends' they don't look right, they sleep all day and stay up all night."
My baggy pants were a godsend since my knees were shaking so badly. But it
was a return to music, which I intend to do the rest of my life.

   As many of you know I was diagnosed with prostate cancer last year. It
was discovered through the P.S.A. (prostate specific antigen) blood test. It
was that easy. I had a blood test that saved my life. I'd done that each
year since I was forty-five. I decided to have the surgery immediately and I
am in fine condition now with perfect blood tests every three months since.
Now my music hero Dan Fogelberg was not so 'lucky.' His good health and
good conditioning hid the fact that a deadly cancer was growing within him.
A simple test would have changed this entire event and he would be alive
today. This can happen to any man. And getting a P.S.A. test at the doctor
is so easy. Embarrassment is not a good enough excuse when you look back on
life. Complacency will not save your life. Good health includes getting your
tests done. Do what they say.

     And Dan, we're gonna miss you.

Delta Dale A...

Giving music lessons in my home:

(In the comfort of my sunny bright sunroom near downtown GB, well stocked with over thirty instruments and amps, PA system, computer, video, etc...)

Slide guitar and tunings (open G, open D, etc)...
Opening tunings and fingerstyle (Hawaiian slack key, DADGAD, DADDAD, DGDGBD, DADFAD, etc)...
Delta blues (Robert Johnson, Charlie Patton, early Muddy waters)...
Finger picking(Travis, use of thumb & finger picks)...
UKULELE, yes I now give Uke lessons! (I have a huge uke collection!)

Bass guitar...
Music theory, chord relationships, circle of fifths, transposing keys, etc...

I taught blues, slide and old time guitar at the University of Wisconsin Green Bay last summer for 60 students grade 8-12 from all over the USA. I worked with a team of six music teachers from three states. I will be there again next summer July 27 through August 1! ......... See: https://www.uwgb.edu/camps/

I'm looking to get a good schedule of students, young and old...
Give me a call! 920-562-0018

Thanks!
Dale A

The Delta Jets! Saturday, August 4, 2007. There we were in The Smoke Daddy, in Chicago! Things were hot!! The crowded room was constantly in motion, people were dancin' in their seats. A birthday party group sang with us and gave us cake! A table full of good-lookin' women swayed and smiled! This group kept getting larger. The last to come into the Smoke Daddy, to join this party was a cute, big blonde with a low-cut top. She looked just fine. As Mark started the bass drum for 'Roll With It', this group was up to leave and the cute big blonde was right in front of me while I sang, 'Blonde hair, blue eyes, this woman is really nice...' She was smiling and dancing! I wanted her to keep smilin' and dancin'. So how am I going to finish the verse that says 'This woman is twice my size' while she's staring me in the eye?  I sang, 'You don't wanna hear it!' as tho' it was another line in a mundane song. Struggling for some good words to bark out instead of TWICE MY SIZE, I watched our two gals, Melissa and Galynne laughing out of control, falling over the table. (They were probably wondering how I'm gonna get myself out of this one!) All the others had left, and our cute, big blonde finally turned to the door, smiling. As the door closed, I could see her outside in the corner of my eye, joining her friends. As if  holding my breath the words finally blurted out! I was safe, hadn't insulted anyone, wouldn't mean to...

It was a memorable experience...