By Matt De Marco

In today’s world of music, the chances of making it big are one in a million…if you’re playing rock, hip-hop, or any popular genre. So what are the odds for a band that plays 40s and 50s style swing music? What are the odds if the band’s name is “Big Bad Voodoo Daddy?”

Also known as “BBVD” for short, is a swing band that emerged 54 years after swing music became popular. Formed in 1989, BBVD consists of nine guys who don’t care about the odds and “just want to play swing music,” says Glen Marhevka, the band’s trumpet player. “The band started as a three-piece group, but then Scotty (Morris, the band’s leader) wanted to get that real, swing sound, so they added the horn section, which is when I joined the group.”

The Chronicle: First off, where did you come up with the name?

Glen Marhevka: It was given to us from blues guitarist Al Collins. He signed a poster for Scotty, and signed it to “Scotty, the Big Bad Voodoo Daddy,” so when the band started it was like the name passed down to us.

TC: How did you get into playing swing music?

GM: When the band first started, we just started finding guys who dug the style of music. We just decided to play what we wanted to play, but we got together and presented it in a cool way, which makes us different.

TC: What were some of the regular places you used to play when BBVD first started?

GM: We started playing anywhere that we could-backyard parties, clubs, little bars…we just kept doing that anything we could do. In early ’93-’94, we started playing a lot in Southern California, mostly in clubs. We tried to travel up and down the coast, hitting everywhere and trying to play anywhere and everywhere.

TC: Any great stories from these places?

GM: I could go a bunch of different directions here (laughs). Well, people had no idea who we were when we first started. Our name doesn’t sound like the name of a swing band. People thought we were a hip-hop group, so a lot of people came in, stared at us like we were aliens for the first few songs, then started to dig what we were doing, and walked out with big smiles on their faces.

TC: Who were some of your inspirations?

GM: Well, I play the trumpet, so a lot of my personal inspirations are jazz players like Miles Davis, Clifford Brown, Dizzy Gillespie-guys like that.

TC: In 1996, your music was used in the movie “Swingers.” How did that affect your careers?

GM: A lot of people don’t realize that we were actually in the movie. The final scene of the movie took place in a club where we were the house band for three years, “The Derby.” It actually was a pretty special sort of role, you know? To be playing yourself in your environment is kind of weird, but it was really cool. It was great because the movie started as this independent film, but it kind of took off. The next thing you know we started branching out further and playing places we hadn’t played before and had a packed house because we were the band from the movie. We played mostly on the West Coast and built up a fan base, but the thing was that we had to keep hitting those places once a month or more to keep the fans. It was so different because we could go to Texas and people knew who we were from the movie without ever being there before.

TC: You have a new album coming out, “How Big Can You Get.” How does it compare to your original album?

GM: It’s a kind of tribute album to Cab Calloway, who’s been a great inspiration to the band. This album is all his material-normally we do all of our own material. We recorded one of his songs on the first album, and we thought it would be really cool if we could do more. He would have been 100 years old when we first started on the project, so this is like his 100th birthday tribute.

TC: You guys performed at the 1999 Superbowl Halftime Show with Stevie Wonder and Gloria Estefan. How was that?

GM: That was really cool…unbelievable. To be there with Stevie was amazing. After we met him that night, we recorded “Sir Duke” with him. Stevie was a huge inspiration for me from when I w as a little kid, his version of “Sir Duke” had such a cool horn line, so to be playing with Stevie was an incredible. The experience was amazing too. The Halftime Show is one of the most watched things on the planet, so to be able to be there…I still don’t believe it.

TC: Your agent said you have been getting ready for an Australian tour and are gonna be on this Tuesday’s “Dancing With the Stars.” That’s pretty awesome. Tell me some more about the tour and the show.

GM: Well we’re going to Australia. We haven’t played there before, and we’ve been trying to go there for a while. We have a pretty large group of fans down there who’ve been writing to us, trying to get us to come play there, so we’re going to play the Byron Bay Bluesfest and some shows in a few cities. This next Tuesday we’re going to be on “Dancing With the Stars.” They’ve used our music before in the past, so it’s cool that they’re having us play live. The show has a huge fan-base, so it’ll be cool to play on a fun show like that-people just dancing and having a good time.

TC: Swing music isn’t really mainstream anymore, so what are you doing to keep yourselves relevant in the music industry?

GM: I mean, we just kind of keep doing our thing, and we have been for years. We play as much as possible-about 150 shows a year; arts festivals, concerts. We never wanted to be the “flavor of the week.” We’re trying to do what we dig and what other people dig. We’ve never made calculated singles to get air play. It’s not our main reason to do it. We just keep going, playing, doing our thing and being ourselves. That’s all you can do-go out there and play. That’s what music’s all about-not getting awards. It’s about putting out music that people dig.