Made up of music professors, doctors, lawyers and other career types, who also had a passion for music, Men of Note began as a group of friends who enjoyed playing together for fun. Over the years, the ensemble's popularity grew and the band played historic locations and events like the prestigious Greenbrier Inn in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia, and the inaugurations of Govs. Martha Layne Collins and Wallace Wilkinson, as well as local gigs around central Kentucky.

"What they furnished to Lexington is high-quality popular and jazz-inflected music produced locally by folks who were involved with music as a vocation or avocation," said Dick Domek, professor emeritus of UK School of Music and member of Men of Note. "The band offered music for listening, dancing, relaxing and celebrating at events like weddings, outdoor concerts, dances, company and private parties, governor’s inaugurations, street fairs, and so on. Their music was enjoyed by a cross section of people of all ages. An organization like that should be — and was — a great source of civic pride for Lexington." 

The Men of Note Collections at the University of Kentucky Special Collections Research Center document the long-running Lexington big band's history from 1967 to 2009. Among the materials collected are recordings, performance memorabilia, and the band's book of arrangements, which is actually an historic, passed-down collection of more than 300 charts dating back to the early 1940s arrangements belonging to five earlier bands.

Source: http://ukpr-srp001546srs.net.uky.edu/content/new-uk-libraries-collections-chronicle-sounds-kentucky