DANCING ON THE WATE: MUSICFEST '93 TONIGHT & SATURDAY AT THE YACHT CLUB

A whole lot of people's favorite bands are lined up for the first annual Music Fest to be held tonight and much of Saturday at the River City Yacht Club in downtown Cape Girardeau.

Besides the headlining Jungle Dogs and St. Stephen's Blues from Carbondale, Ill., the eclectic bill also includes Esspresso Bongo, Duo-Sonic, the Moore Brothers, and Carter & Connelley. The event is co-sponsored by Port Cape Girardeau and Q-99 radio.

Doc Cain of Port Cape Girardeau said the intent of the Music Fest is to shake the summer doldrums.

"There's not a lot going on in the city. It's time to wake people up a little bit."

Tonight's headliners, the notorious Jungle Dogs, ought to be able to handle that. The seven-piece band is known for their anything-goes stage act and a style of music their publicity photo describes as "Rockreggaecalypsoskafunk."

Calypso? Yes, those are Harry Belafonte's greatest hits on their playlist.

Jungle Dogs have been called one of the ultimate party bands. They can be raunchy and are as politically incorrect as they want to be. "Nothing's correct," says guitarist Dan Schingel.

Bassist Eddie Chapa calls the 'Dogs show "a fun dance party kind of scene."

Jungle Dogs cover the gamut from Marley to Violent Femmes. They throw in some of their own '50s and Latin-influence originals, and expect the audience to do their part too. "We like to break down the barriers...," said Schingel.

Jungle Dogs have been together about seven years. Before that many of them played in a band called Love Rhino. The band consists of bass, drums, guitar and keyboards plus a trumpet, sax and trombone fondly known as the Tarzan Horns.

Schingel said the band's performances usually are shaped by the kind of crowd they're playing for, and each one is different.

"Cape Girardeau crowds wear better clothes," he said.

"And they smell better," Chapa added.

Opening the festival at 6 tonight, St. Louis-based Esspresso Bongo is a new band with familiar faces. Most if not all the players are former members of the recently defunct Heads Above Water and the lovingly remembered Normal People bands.

Jungle Dogs are due to begin at 9 p.m.

Saturday night's headliners will be St. Stephen's Blues, which includes a guitarist some regard as the area's best. Robbie Stokes is a veteran of the San Francisco music scene that produced the Grateful Dead, a band St. Stephen's Blues often is compared to.

"We're a bunch of old guys about the age of the Dead," says sax player Kevin Cox.

Stokes played in a band that opened for Creedence Clearwater Revival, Quicksilver Messenger Service and the Allman Brothers. Stokes also played on Dead drummer Mickey Hart's solo album

The band derives its name from a Dead song "St. Stephen" they do not play.

Cox, who describes himself as "a second-generation jazzer," said he usually describes St. Stephen's music as "Blues, Dead, Dylan."

This is a band with many interchangeable parts, players who perform with them only in St. Louis and like that. A core, including Stokes and Cox, also play in a classic rock band called 4 on the Floor.

The other guitarist, Jimmy Salatino, also heads up a power trio that plays music by Hendrix and Creem.

All of these parts can be heard in a distilled form when St. Stephen's Blues performs.

On Saturday, the band will be augmented by a percussionist from Venezuela whose name Cox could not remember.

Saturday's music will begin at 2 p.m. with a two-hour set by Duo-Sonic, a St. Louis-based guitar and bass act that sometimes plays nearby Broussard's. The rock-oriented band consists of Brad Springmeyer on guitar and Greg Hopkins on bass.

The Moore Brothers, Mark and Chris, will play from 4-6 p.m. Mark, who lives in St. Louis, frequently entertains at Broussard's as a single. Chris is the owner of a video production company in Cape Girardeau. Their instrumentation also is guitar and bass, but they lean more toward an acoustic sound than Duo-Sonic.

Checking in from 6-9 p.m. Saturday will be Carter & Connelley, a new four-piece band that claims to play "environmental music with a message."

Curt Carter is the environmental workshop program coordinator at Touch of Nature, a Southern Illinois University department. Tom Connelley is the technical director at the SIU Student Center.

Stand-up bass player Geoff Maring and new fiddle player Bill Cronin round out the band, whose music ranges across pure folk, folk rock, country, gospel and blues.

"Their harmonies sound like entire choirs; their guitar interaction is breathtaking," one Nightlife reviewer wrote.

Carter & Connelley likes to excavate songs like Mason Profit's "Two Hangmen" or Country Joe and the Fish's "Save the Whales" from the rock 'n' roll catacombs. "We sing a lot of songs that were alternative when they were new," Connelley says.

They have their own radio show every Sunday night from 8-10 on WSIU-FM.

Admission to the two-day Music Fest is $9 in advance. No one under 21 will be allowed in. Tickets are available at both Port Cape Girardeau restaurants. Commemorative T-shirts with a design by Cape Girardeau artist Don Greenwood will be sold.

Cain said the Yacht Club will hold happy hours both days and will sell discounted food. T-shirts, Cardinal baseball tickets, CDs and concert tickets will be given away on Saturday.