| About Us |
We've gone thru a few incarnations since the base group first formed in 1998. Some of our past dates included the GO Jazz festival and featured the goddess of blues Mary Haitz and guitarist Mark Manneta formerly with Chuck Mangione, The Strawberry Festival a few times and Stage 13. The recent name change from The Galaxies to ZAKS Pak happened in early 2005. The main goal of the group hasn't changed - a mix of tunes remembered and restyled with some of the more unusual hits mixed in. With keyboards, horn lines and a great rhythm section we add the touch of great players to top it off. The bottom end is held down by Jon Perry on bass and vocals. A recent immigrant and native of Milwaukee (and former cheese head), Jon has played with a variety of Milwaukee area bands including: Grant Central Station, Louisiana Belle and Mickey and the Malcontents. Rumors that Jon played in the Thingamaquats are totally unfounded. For touches of class and velvet, on Vocals, Trumpet and Flugel Horn, George Conte is another continuous Rochesterian. It's easier for George to count the places that he hasn't played rather than the ones he has. A wide vocal range, a dead on melody on his trumpet rounded out with a kick ass flugelhorn. George was a member of the infamous "Horn Dogs" of "T. Blast and the Horn Dogs" fame that played at venues in all around the city. Before that George played with numerous party bands and jazz groups at supper clubs, restaurants and festivals in and around town. Finally there's the screaming B3 organ sound of Leon "Corky" Zak. In the rock music scene for years - some of the groups he's played with include - The Furys at the Geneseo Varsity Inn, he was one of the original Gunthers Bus members, Jacobs Downtown Trolley, the Majestics, Greenwich Mean, The Vistas, on the road to Nashville with Chris Beard, fill-in with Reporter, Niagra Casino with Billy B. and the Rockers and more. And of course the original Galaxies with his brother Mike Bonafede of Black Sheep fame. In May Corky played with Dr. Lonnie Smith doing a dual B3 jam at the Go Art Jazz Festival. It was AAAmazing. Dr. Smith on a B3, Corky on a B3, Mike Bonafede on drums, Wendal Rivera on Congas, Mel Henderson on guitar, Aaron Robinson on percussion - won a standing ovation from a full house! For those that know what a B3 is - Corkys was the second Hammond he owned - purchased from a little old lady that only played church hymns on it. He's owned it since 1967. The other B3 was that owned by Larry "Rose" Crozier from the original Black Sheep and up until a couple years ago the organ (a Bill chop) toured the world with Foreigner. |