Posted 3:13 p.m. Friday, Sept. 12, 2014
UW-L Music Professor Gary Walth hopes he has a hit with a fight song he penned late this summer for the La Crosse Loggers baseball team.
[caption id="attachment_36176" align="alignright" width="300"]
Gary Walth, center, with two La Crosse Loggers players at Copeland Park. The players include Aaron Knapp, right, a sophomore from California-Berkeley; and Ryan Kirby, a sophomore from the University from San Diego, who stayed at the Walth home during summer. Walth has written a fight song for the Northwoods League team.[/caption]
UW-La Crosse Music Professor Gary Walth hopes he has a hit with a fight song he penned late this summer for the La Crosse Loggers baseball team. Early indications are he hit a home run.
Walth, and his wife, Cathy, have been season ticket holders the last five years and have served as host parents for players the last two. So, he knew the Loggers organization well. Walth had a feeling for the style of music he thought would be right for the Loggers, a team that annually brings in the second highest attendance in the Northwoods League.
“I also wanted the lyrics to be descriptive in their content,” explains Walth. “I wanted to include things that set this team apart from the others in the league like mascots Louie the Logger and Logger Dog, the Copeland Crazies — the fans — and, of course, their home field, Copeland Park, also called The Lumberyard.”
Walth was excited when Loggers General Manager Chris Goodell liked “We are the Loggers,” as did co-owner Dan Kapanke. They wanted to use it immediately and it was introduced to the fans at the final home game of the season on Aug. 10.
“I think people liked it,” says Godell. “We plan to use it for many things — commercials, radio jingles and more.”
Walth, director of UW-L Choral Studies, says he’s heard positive things from the Logger Nation. “Several Logger players also complimented me on the song and the catchiness of the tune,” he notes.
This isn’t Walth’s first fight song. The well-known choral composer wrote one for a new high school in Aurora, Colorado, while living there in the late ’80s. He has also composed a number of commercial jingles.
Hear the song
The official recording of ”We are the Loggers” includes UW-L staff Karyn Quinn and Sharon Shagrue, recent graduate Luke Thering, and students Cori Vought, Jacy Gnacinski, Brandon Martinez, Christine Stein, Brett Hulmer, Corey Holloway, Seth Steidl and incoming freshman Samantha McCoy. Also singing for the recording were several fans and Loggers employees, including co-owner Ruth Kapanke.
[audio m4a="http://news.uwlax.edu/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/01-We-Are-The-Loggers-1-2.m4a"][/audio]
‘We are the Loggers’
words and music by Gary Walth
We are the Loggers, your La Crosse Loggers,
The Northwood's team that’s gonna finish on top.
All across the nation they’re causing a sensation,
And with the Copeland Crazies the Loggers won’t stop!
So cheer for the Loggers, your La Crosse Loggers,
Summer baseball at its best.
Come on Coulee Region, it’s baseball season.
Cheer for the Loggers today!
We are the Loggers, your La Crosse Loggers,
College players, their school’s future stars.
The Lumberyard is shakin’, a champion’s in the makin’,
The baseballs are soarin’ and the Loggers are scorin’.
So cheer for the Loggers, your La Crosse Loggers,
Summer baseball at its best.
Your fam’ly has been waitin’ to join the celebratin’,
Logger Dog and Louie will be actin’ kind of screwy,
Come on Coulee Region, it’s baseball season.
Cheer for the Loggers today!
Another local fight song
Gary Walth’s fight song is the area’s second fight song written for a La Crosse team. It comes more than a quarter century after another Music Department faculty member, Joyce Grill, wrote UW-L’s first official fight song, La Crosse. Before its debut in 1987, songs set to the tunes of popular melodies and other schools — Beer Barrel Polka and On Wisconsin — were used to get UW-L crowds fired up.
[audio mp3="http://news.uwlax.edu/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/09_LA_CROSSE-1.mp3"][/audio]
Gary Walth, center, with two La Crosse Loggers players at Copeland Park. The players include Aaron Knapp, right, a sophomore from California-Berkeley; and Ryan Kirby, a sophomore from the University from San Diego, who stayed at the Walth home during summer. Walth has written a fight song for the Northwoods League team.[/caption]
UW-La Crosse Music Professor Gary Walth hopes he has a hit with a fight song he penned late this summer for the La Crosse Loggers baseball team. Early indications are he hit a home run.
Walth, and his wife, Cathy, have been season ticket holders the last five years and have served as host parents for players the last two. So, he knew the Loggers organization well. Walth had a feeling for the style of music he thought would be right for the Loggers, a team that annually brings in the second highest attendance in the Northwoods League.
“I also wanted the lyrics to be descriptive in their content,” explains Walth. “I wanted to include things that set this team apart from the others in the league like mascots Louie the Logger and Logger Dog, the Copeland Crazies — the fans — and, of course, their home field, Copeland Park, also called The Lumberyard.”
Walth was excited when Loggers General Manager Chris Goodell liked “We are the Loggers,” as did co-owner Dan Kapanke. They wanted to use it immediately and it was introduced to the fans at the final home game of the season on Aug. 10.
“I think people liked it,” says Godell. “We plan to use it for many things — commercials, radio jingles and more.”
Walth, director of UW-L Choral Studies, says he’s heard positive things from the Logger Nation. “Several Logger players also complimented me on the song and the catchiness of the tune,” he notes.
This isn’t Walth’s first fight song. The well-known choral composer wrote one for a new high school in Aurora, Colorado, while living there in the late ’80s. He has also composed a number of commercial jingles.
Hear the song
The official recording of ”We are the Loggers” includes UW-L staff Karyn Quinn and Sharon Shagrue, recent graduate Luke Thering, and students Cori Vought, Jacy Gnacinski, Brandon Martinez, Christine Stein, Brett Hulmer, Corey Holloway, Seth Steidl and incoming freshman Samantha McCoy. Also singing for the recording were several fans and Loggers employees, including co-owner Ruth Kapanke.
[audio m4a="http://news.uwlax.edu/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/01-We-Are-The-Loggers-1-2.m4a"][/audio]
‘We are the Loggers’
words and music by Gary Walth
We are the Loggers, your La Crosse Loggers,
The Northwood's team that’s gonna finish on top.
All across the nation they’re causing a sensation,
And with the Copeland Crazies the Loggers won’t stop!
So cheer for the Loggers, your La Crosse Loggers,
Summer baseball at its best.
Come on Coulee Region, it’s baseball season.
Cheer for the Loggers today!
We are the Loggers, your La Crosse Loggers,
College players, their school’s future stars.
The Lumberyard is shakin’, a champion’s in the makin’,
The baseballs are soarin’ and the Loggers are scorin’.
So cheer for the Loggers, your La Crosse Loggers,
Summer baseball at its best.
Your fam’ly has been waitin’ to join the celebratin’,
Logger Dog and Louie will be actin’ kind of screwy,
Come on Coulee Region, it’s baseball season.
Cheer for the Loggers today!
Another local fight song
Gary Walth’s fight song is the area’s second fight song written for a La Crosse team. It comes more than a quarter century after another Music Department faculty member, Joyce Grill, wrote UW-L’s first official fight song, La Crosse. Before its debut in 1987, songs set to the tunes of popular melodies and other schools — Beer Barrel Polka and On Wisconsin — were used to get UW-L crowds fired up.
[audio mp3="http://news.uwlax.edu/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/09_LA_CROSSE-1.mp3"][/audio]