Dear Mechanical Music Enthusiasts,  The 67th Annual Meeting of the
Musical Box Society International is rapidly approaching on Wednesday,
August 31, through Saturday, September 3.

We have been able to obtain a great rate at a beautiful hotel right
in the heart of downtown Minneapolis, the Minneapolis Marriott City
Center.  The normal cost is in the ballpark of $400/night; your
conference rate is only $99/night.

The conference rate cut-off has been extended through midnight
Monday, August 15.  You can reserve your room at 1-800-228-9290.
(If you are bringing a car, a special parking rate of only $12/night
is also available.)  The conference registration form is available
at http://www.mbsi.org/ 

While the meeting officially begins on Thursday evening, some great
optional tours are available on Wednesday and Thursday at reasonable
prices.  Several local members have quietly assembled collections of
surprising magnitude and quality, and they are opening their doors to
you.  Everything is available from fine quality music boxes to mammoth
fair organs.

One limitation of the hotel conference room rate is that our block of
rooms quickly sold out for Tuesday night, August 30th.  In fact, all
hotels in downtown Minneapolis are pretty full that night.  Therefore,
if you would like to do the Wednesday tours, we suggest that you spend
Tuesday night either near the airport or the Mall of America (which
are close to each other and connected by light rail).  You can find
nice rooms there for on the order of $100/night.  You can then take the
light rail train to within 1 block of the Marriott on Wednesday morning
and check your bags there to join the tours.

The conference planning team has worked hard to assemble a great line-up
of tours, workshops, and open houses.  A large mart will be held on
Saturday.  The Annual Banquet features a concert by local ragtime and
early jazz legend Butch Thompson, who was the house pianist at the
Prairie Home Companion during its heady formative years.  (For those who
are interested, you can arrange to see Garrison Keillor host the Prairie
Home Companion at the Minnesota State Fair on Friday night.  The State
Fair is easily accessible from the conference hotel and is quite a
memorable experience in itself.)

We hope to see you in Minneapolis at the end of the month!

Best regards,
Tom Chase