The Lake Michigan MBSI & Chicago AMICA Chapters invite you to a joint MBSI & AMICA Convention.
Mark your calendars for August 20-24, 2025
Returning to the Hyatt Regency Schamburg hotel with a discounted room rate of $135 + tax.
Tours
Each tour departs in the morning and returns mid to late afternoon. Register early to get tours of your choice.
Wednesday & Thursday – Kresmery & Sanfilippo Perfume Passage – Lunch at the Kresmery home.
Kurt Kresmery grew up across the street from the Sanfilippo estate. After school and on weekends Kurt would work on various projects for Jasper. After years in commercial real estate, Kurt has rehabbed a downtown Elgin, Illinois factory building which is now home for him and a significant collection of mechanical music and antiques. In addition to a Welte Style 3 Cottage Orchestrion is a wide variety of American coin pianos and orchestrions including a Seeburg H and Peerless Wisteria. Kurt is having his Elgin-made Seybold player piano rebuilt in time for Thursday evening’s Pumper Contest.
Perfume Passage is Jeffrey and Rusty Sanfilippo’s incredible 6,000 sq. ft. addition to the Sanfilippo home in Barrington Hills, Illinois. Several galleries including an 1882 drugstore and soda fountain recreation display thousands of artifacts. The collections tell the history of perfume and its industry. Jasper witnessed this accomplishment with great pleasure. Also, during the visit Sanfilippo Foundation director, Greg Leifel will give a special session within the music collection. https://www.perfumepassage.org/
Wednesday Only – Woelbing & Organ Piper Pizza – Lunch will include varieties of pizza and soft drinks.
Paul Woelbing, President of Carma Labs in Franklin, Wisconsin spent fifteen years expanding the Chicago Nortown’s 3-manual, 15 rank Wurlitzer theatre organ to 4 manuals and 90 ranks. The instrument includes 6,500 pipes and many additional effects all of which we will experience. The former 20,000 sq. ft. warehouse also houses Paul’s vintage Harley Davidson motorcycle collection. Nearby we will also visit a recent arrival, the 100-key Welte Philharmonic Orchestrion. https://www.atos.org/organ/wisconsin/franklin/carmex-labs
Organ Piper Pizza is a music palace in Greenfield, Wisconsin which includes a 30 rank Wurlitzer theater organ. The restaurant will open just for our visit where we will have lunch and enjoy house organist, Zach Frame on the console. https://www.organpiperpizza.com/
Thursday Only- Halim Museum & Volo Museum – Box lunches and drinks will be included.
The Halim Museum is a time and glass museum in Evanston, Illinois with a collection of over 1,100 timepieces on display including musical clocks and automata as well as an 18th century android dulcimer. An extensive collection of masterpiece stained glass windows, including pieces by Tiffany, Tillinghast, Lamb and Sperry tell the story of the American School of Stained Glass. The Museum will open this day specifically for our groups. https://www.halimmuseum.org/
The Volo Auto Museum, located in Volo, Illinois was established in 1960 by the Grams family. Originally focused on antique, classic and muscle cars, in recent years it has added a carousel and collection of automatic musical instruments for which the late Tim Trager was largely responsible. Fellow member, Terry Younce has offered to docent during our visits.
https://www.volocars.com/the-attraction/exhibits/carousel-and-music-hall
Foot-Pumper Contest Invitation
This year at the 2025 AMICA/MBSI Convention in Chicago, IL, the Foot-Pumper Contest will take place on Thursday evening. This is a truly AMICA tradition that, in my opinion, is one of the highlights of our Convention. It has all the suspense, excitement, and amazement that comes from creating a REALISTIC performance from a paper music roll! To accomplish that, the performer needs an instrument that can respond to the nuances of snappy pedaling, tempo changes, and through the judicious use the levers in the key slip, expression. The featured instrument this year will be a Seybold player piano, made in Elgin, Illinois.
Jerry Biasella is working with Kurt Kresmery, to make sure it is in top shape for the competition. This is a good-humored event that has a panel of judges who will score each contestant based on a loosely-followed set of rules that can be found on the AMICA website or at the end of this article. Bring your favorite 88 note performance roll along with others to play at your leisure during the convention. Please don’t be shy about entering. With the allotted time we should have up to 12 entries that will be taken on a first-come basis. If you’re the winner, you will have the exclusive right to keep the “Golden Footsie Award” for a whole year! It comes with its own carrying case for easy transportation and, like the famous hockey Stanley Cup, the names of all past winners are engraved on the trophy.
Please send me an e-mail if you’d like to participate.
Sincerely, Joel Cluskey, Convention Co-Chair and Past President Email: Ampico2018@gmail.com