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A perennial favorite, the Joe Sharino Band again opens Los Gatos' Music in the Plaza series.
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Music in the Plaza comes with summer
Joe Sharino Band kicks off the popular series
By Shari Kaplan
When the weather turns hotter and the days turn longer, Los Gatans turn to the Town Plaza Park for another hallmark of summertime: Music in the Plaza, a community program by the Los Gatos Arts Commission.
This year is no different, with the free concert series opening June 25, and running every Sunday through Aug. 27. The only deviation will be one Tuesday concert--July 4--which takes place on the front lawn of Los Gatos High School.
Additionally, the Aug. 20 concert is preceded by the annual Los Gatos Food Fest, a fundraiser for and arranged by A Place for Teens, also known as The Outhouse. From 2 to 5 p.m., as many as 14 local restaurants and coffeehouses will offer sample-size portions of their wares in exchange for tickets visitors can purchase from the Outhouse's teen members. A disc jockey will provide pre-concert entertainment.
The first MIP concert is the Joe Sharino band, an Oakhurst-based group known for its eclectic repertoire that includes rock, pop, Motown, swing and country music spanning six decades. Sharino, a radio/TV/broadcasting major at San Jose State University, moonlighted at South Bay nightclubs in the early 1970s; he later drew a following that resulted in standing-room-only acoustic gigs.
By the late 1970s, he gathered other talented musicians and formed the Joe Sharino Band. The group has won more than a dozen awards from Northern California newspapers and magazines, has released albums and a music video and performs at many public and private affairs each year.
Funding for MIP's various expenses comes from donations by citizens, small merchants and larger businesses. Each Sunday performance also has one or two major sponsors, whose names are printed in the concert programs. The 2000 lineup is as follows:
* June 25: The Joe Sharino Band;
* July 2: Mark Russo & The Classic Sounds, a swing band;
* July 4: The San Jose Wind Symphony;
* July 9: Swing Solution;
* July 16: Country Band Fred McCarty & Co.;
* July 23: Celtic Heart;
* July 30: San Jose Opera Guild;
* Aug. 6: The Heartbeats, a rock band;
* Aug. 13: Dixieland jazz by Cell Block Seven;
* Aug. 20: Delta Wires, a rhythm & blues band;
* Aug. 27: Music and folkloric dancing of Mexico performed by Mariachi Tapatio and Alika del Nayar, respectively.
The Los Gatos Arts Commission always welcomes donations for MIP. For more information, call 408.354.6820.
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Los Gatos, California Since 1881
