Big Bad Voodoo Daddy to Shake Things Up

Big Bad Voodoo Daddy brings the swing to Alpharetta when the band performs with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra on Saturday at .

Glen "The Kid" Marhevka, one of two trumpeters with the band took some time this week to talk about the band and its performances.

"The basic style of it is swing music, but we don't do traditional big band music," Marhevka said.

Big Bad Voodoo Daddy is a smaller band with five horns, a piano, a bass and drums that does mostly original music.

"It's a very high energy band and it's just super fun," he said.

Performing with a live orchestra is nothing new for then band. Marhevka estimates they've performed with 80 percent of the orchestras in North America, including several times already with the ASO in the past eight years.

Performing with an orchestra is definitely different with so many musicians on stage, he said.

"It's really fun and exciting to have so many musicians on stage performing together," Marhevka said.

He said some members of the band liken it to "driving a big ole 1950s car versus driving a small, modern compact car."

It's big and luxurious, and feels really elegant being able to play the band's music with that many musicians.

Playing with some of the symphony orchestras such as the ASO, Marhevka said the musical level is high, making it great to play with that caliber of musicians.

The band likely will do a few songs from their latest album, "How Big Can You Get, The Music of Cab Calloway."

Marhevka said sometimes in the middle of the show the orchestra will stay on stage while the band plays on its own.

"We like to do a few from sort of the Cotton Club era, give that sort of vibe to it," he said. "We kind of mix it up. We do a few from our different albums over the years."

Toward the end of the concert fans can expect to hear some of the band's most popular tunes, which might include "You and Me and the Bottle Makes 3 Tonight" and "Go Daddy-O."

Throughout the night concert goers might hear tunes from all of the band's albums–and maybe even some all new original music the band plans to release on a new album that should come out sometime toward the beginning of next year.

Marhevka has been with the band since 1995. He grew up playing in big bands from the time he was in junior high school. He'd been playing in 17-piece big bands when he joined Big Bad Voodoo Daddy. At the time the band was playing the kind of musical style's he'd been playing pretty much his whole life.

Marhevka studied music in college, earning a bachelor's degree in music performance.

Visit the amphitheater's website for more concert information or to buy tickets, which range in price from $12 to $35.