Music

Brian McGoldrick, owner of Admiral D’s Waterfront Tavern, likens the effect music has on people walking, biking and boating past his restaurant to something like that of a pied piper. Several nights a week, when small electric and acoustic bands play on his 5,000-square-foot lakeside patio, the melodies wafting on the breeze “draw people in, and create a really nice environment,” says McGoldrick, now in his eighth summer of operating the seasonal bar and restaurant on the lake’s western shore. Read more about White Bear Lake Summer Concert Series

With the release of his third studio album, Crooked Lines, White Bear Lake musician Tim Cheesebrow is taking his sound in a bit of a new direction. While he describes most of his previous work as more solidly within the folk genre, this newest collection is more of an “Americana alt-country folk-rock kind of thing.” Inspired by a “weird mish-mash of influences,” Cheesebrow says that creating the album was driven by his work with Discover Music, the nonprofit he runs that teaches songwriting to middle and high school students in local public schools. Read more about White Bear Lake Musician Tim Cheesebrow Releases New Album

Katy Vernon, a London-born singer/songwriter who has been a White Bear Lake resident for eight years, always dreamed of being a musician. “Even as a little kid I would make up songs,” she says. As she grew, she wrote about life, love and loss.

Years later, after taking a break to raise a family, Vernon reignited her musical ambition in 2012 with a successful Kickstarter campaign, which helped finance her first CD. “Kickstarter did more than raise the money,” Vernon says. “It did its job—it kick-started my career.” Read more about Katy Vernon from White Bear Lake Releases Her Second Full-length Album

For musical duo John Evans and Dan Perry, regardless of the venue, the mission is always the same: “To make sure people feel better when they leave than when they came in,” says longtime White Bear Lake resident Evans, who moved to WBL in 1971, with his wife, Cathy. Read more about ‘Legends’ in Their Own Time

Peter O’Gorman first discovered his love for percussion while playing at the lunchroom table in elementary school at St. Mary’s of the Lake. Since then, he’s performed at high-profile events across the nation, composed two dozen concert pieces, written two books, received grants from the American Composers Forum and the McKnight Foundation. He’s also a 2015 McKnight Composer Fellow. We caught up with O’Gorman to learn more about his career in music and his love for the unusual sounds his instruments create. Read more about Sultan of Sound

Seldom does a Wednesday night worship band include members who have played backup for Celine Dion, sung vocals for Mary J. Blige or worked with Prince. But at St. Andrew’s Lutheran Church, contemporary worship director and vocalist Sara Renner has put together such a group with Tonia Hughes, Billy Steele, Cory Wong, Tim Zhorne and Bill Chouinard. Read more about Wednesday Night Worship With the Stars

“It was very fun to play at my daughter’s school,” says Katy Vernon about performing at the Matoska Music Festival, a fundraiser for the annual fourth-grade camp experience for Matoska International IB School students. Read more about Giving Back in Song