Knightly News

Marcon informs us that there's no room for us on their schedule this year; so we won't be going to Columbus, OH in May. (Bummer, we were really looking forward to hanging with Robert Asprin!) On the other hand, I-Con wants us; so we will be heading to Long Island in April.

The Boogie Knights have been offered a second performance slot at Farpoint and we have accepted. We will be in the Valley Room Saturday at 11AM and in the Hunt Room Sunday at 11AM next week.

Alice, the Cooper's Daughter writes: My nineteen-year-old brother, Robbie, the Official Squire of the Boogie Knights, is currently engaged in an epic battle with acute myelogenous leukemia at Yale-New Haven hospital. From DC, there's not a lot I can do for the kid, but we can help make it so that families don't have to go through this in the future. Please donate to the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society in honor of Robbie Greenberger and drop a note to kgreenbergerATgmailDOTcom. Can we raise $500 (reached on 5 FEB) $1000 (reached by 8 FEB) $2000 for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society?

The link is https://www.leukemia-lymphoma.org/all_donate?item_id=8072.

Our squire, Robbie Greenberger, is in the hospital undergoing intensive treatment for Acute Myeloid Leukemia. His attitude is excellent and his family and friends are very supportive. The Boogie Knights send the best of wishes to our dedicated squire for his complete recovery.

We had a great time at Dragon*Con. Thank you to all the folks to came to our concerts or stopped by our table.

We've been working with Tom Smith, the new Filk Director at Dragon*Con and we're happy to announce that we will have a 90-minute concert in the Filk program. It's for the night owls. Our concert starts at 11:30 on Friday night and ends at 1AM Saturday morning. Right after that, we'll be participating in open filk if we haven't expired from exhaustion.

We're still in negotiations regarding a concert on the Concourse.

Thank you all so much for your ethusiastic participation in our concerts. We were very touched by all the people who went out of their way to tell us how much they've enjoyed our concerts over the years. We were also touched that two of our superfans who live out of the area -- Sue DeG. and Fran -- made it a point to come to Maryland specifically to celebrate our anniversary. It was a delight to see them.

And speaking of special effort, we would like to express our sincere thanks to Bob Ahrens (pictured) -- aka "Syd De Vicious", one of the original Boogie Knights -- who joined us on stage for our concert Saturday. Bob, it was great to work with you again. You did a fine job.

The only regret was that Kate (Alice the Cooper's Daughter) could not be with us due to a death in her family. We wish her and her family healing peace and look forward to her impending return to DC (District of Columbia) to prepare for D*C (Dragon*Con).

The Boogie Knights will have three (3) concerts at Shore Leave: Our Official 25th Anniversary Concert at 11AM Saturday in the Valley Ballroom, a half-hour kid's concert in the McCormick Suite at 1PM Saturday, and the con-closing concert on Sunday at 5PM in the Hunt/Valley Ballroom.

Heather Scheeler (Lady Sarah of McLachlan) is playing Cha-Cha De Gregorio, the best dancer in all of St. Bernadette's in "Grease" at Toby's Dinner Theatre in Baltimore MD which is getting rave reviews.

"2nd Star Productions' take on musical is simply magical ... Cinderella's stepmother, Heidi Toll, and her daughters, Linda Swann (Florinda) and Jennifer Toll (Lucinda), are nastily funny...."

The Knights had a great time at Marcon. Considering we're practically unknown in Ohio, we had a good turnout at our concert. It was fun to watch the audience during our concert to see as they "Got it!" on each song. Our performance was greatly enhanced by Judi, who artistically interpreted for the deaf. Open filk was fun and it was great to enjoy the performances of Three Weird Sisters, Michael Longcor, and Bill & Gretchen Roper.

Found out why the Maryland Faerie Festival never bothered to answer us. Their line is "We don't hire filkers." (So, we're too filk for the festival and not filk enough for most filkers.) We attended anyway to see Emerald Rose and ran into a bunch of old friends. It was a pleasant day and Emerald Rose kicked butt as usual.

"Greenberger is the one who steals the entire show though. Her Adelaide is flamboyant, jolly and always entertaining. Her presence on stage is felt whenever she's off and her aura is so strong that, on many occasions, it upstages her co-stars."

We're trying to see if the Maryland Faerie Festival (May 19-20, Upper Marlboro, MD) would like us to perform. 'Course, they may not need us because they already have the vastly talented Emerald Rose as their official musical guests.

At Lunacon 50 in March, our concerts were well received. Not particularly well attended, but those who attended were very enthusiastic. And now we've experienced the imfamous "Escher Hilton." Been there, done that, got the T-shirts (because they listed our names on the back!).

At Farpoint in February, we were each honored with our own Volker/McChesney Awards and received very nice tributes from Steve Wilson and author/filker Robert Asprin (via email). We also received this very nice testimony from Bob Ahrens (former Boogie Knight, Syd the Vicious):

"Hello everyone. My name is Bob... (pause) ...and I am a Boogie Knight...
But as you know, admitting you have a problem...
I'd like to thank the conchair and the committee for allowing me to speak here tonight.
It is a great honor that they wish to bestow upon a group of people I am very fortunate to call my friends. Over the years, you have come to know them by different names: Theo. Sara. John. Alice. Dionne. Lady Pinque and KRAD. This was done, of course, to protect the guilty. For 25 years, the Boogie Knights have pushed the outer envelope of Filk, fan entertainment, and con-going in general. To miss one of their shows is truly a loss, and if you're seeing your first Boogie concert this year, welcome to the fold. Over the years, they have reminded us it's fun to go Jousting, and that Arthur Rex is King, and yes, it's ok to Polymorph your Mother and Fireball your Dad. Their cunning lyrics, set to many of our favorite songs, enthrall the attendees of conventions all over the east coast (And will enthrall fans here on this stage tomorrow at eleven.) Detractors have said, "Wouldn't fandom have managed fine without them?" Perhaps, but we'd undoutedly suffer for the loss.
Because of their music, camaraderie, comedy and drama, and their uncanny ability to keep their shows fresh, funny and alive, this convention has chosen them to receive the first annual Volker-McChesney award for their ongoing contribution to fandom and the con experience. Please join me now in congratulating a great singing group and more importantly, my friends. To all past and present members of the Boogie Knights, fandom thanks you.

The only thing that could have made it better was if we could have all been there, but Kate Greenberger was/is still in Cairo, her parents and Keith DeCandido were still on the road down from NYC, and Dave Keefer's van broke down on the Baltimore Beltway on the way there. However, Keith, his fiancee Terri Osborne, the Keefers and the Kate's family did make it to the party afterwards.

Our Farpoint concerts went REALLY well, our CD sales were good, and everyone had fun. Linda even won the James Bond-themed Banquet costume contest dressed as Dolly, Jaws' girlfriend from "Moonraker."

We've just found out that we will be part of the halftime entertainment at the Masquerade this coming Saturday night at Farpoint.

Heather Scheeler (Lady Sarah) will be performing in "George M" at Toby's Dinner Theatre in Columbia, MD, 22 Feb - 10 Jun 2007.

We've been notified by the Farpoint convention co-chairs, Sharon Van Blarcom and Sandy Zier-Teitler that:

"The Farpoint committee is pleased to announce that The Boogie Knights have been selected as the recipient of the Volker/McChesney Award. This award has grown out of our annual recognition of Fan Guest of Honor and was named after Bev Volker and Marion McChesney, both past Baltimore con chairs. The award is given in recognition of a fan's or group's service to and support of Fandom and the fan community. The Knights, along with 3 other nominees, were nominated by Farpoint fan members, and the final selection was made by the Farpoint committee. Congratulations to The Boogie Knights on their award and their 25th anniversary!"

We're really excited and honored by this.

Good news: We'll be guests at Marcon (Columbus, OH, Memorial Day weekend) where our own Krad the Obscure (Keith R.A. DeCandido) is the Author Guest of Honor.

Bad news: Due to personal commitments, we will not have enough Knights to make a quorum for ConCarolinas (Charlotte, NC, 1-3 June)and we have had to cancel that appearance. We greatly regret this because they were very nice to us and we truly enjoyed our experience there last year.

Heather Scheeler finished the National AIDS Marathon in Florence, Italy in 5 hours, 29 minutes and 18 seconds (05:29:18). She shaved a full 30 MINUTES off last year's time of 6 hours and 33 seconds (06:00:33)!!! The Knights are very proud of her!

The Boogie Knights made the paper! Our Halloween performance was reviewed in the Howard County Times. We've recreated the article here.

The Boogie Knights now have a group on Yahoo! If you'd like to be kept up to date on Boogie Knights concerts and CDs, please join bk-filk.

DragonCon was a great success. Our concerts were well received and we had a great time visiting with our Southern friends, seeing the stars, watching the parade, dining together, and participating in Open Filk. Our CD sales were good and we had fun manning the table on the concourse. In fact, the Boogie Knights had a wonderful time right up to the point where John broke his wrist. But there's good news. The surgery to repair the break went well and he can expect to regain full use and range of motion.

Kate Greenberger (Alice, the Cooper's Daughter) is happily ensconced in Cairo, Egypt. We wish her every success at college and hope she has a wonderful time and returns to us safe and sound next spring.

SHORE LEAVE: We had a good morning concert and an incredibly well received concert during the masquerade halftime where we debuted the wireless mikes. The standing-room-only crowd waved cellphones and lightsabers during "Arthurian Pie" and didn't want to let us off the stage for the judges to announce the masquerade winners.

The Boogie Knights won "First Place in Showcase of Champions" and "Judges' Choice" for our costume entry at the Shore Leave 28 masquerade. (And Sharon won "Best Beading" in workmanship for her bodice.)

We would like to thank the friends who helped us with the costumes and concerts, the folks running Shore Leave and its masquerade, and all the fans who stayed in the ballroom for our concert. By the way, if have any pictures of us in costume that you'd be willing to share, we'd really like to hear from you.