Julie Legner is a force to be reckoned with in the Brandon community. She is a realtor, pianist, performer, one half of the local band The Wonder Twins and a mom.
If you ask Legner how she does all of these things, she’ll tell you, “Luckily, I have the most supportive and musically-inclined family.”
“It’s my husband, Joe, who had it way worse with his schedule. For the past five years, he has worked as a structural engineer with TECO, played in the band and worked with me to parent our two great now-teenaged sons, Joey, who is 16 and can play piano, and Tommy, who is 14 and can rock a guitar,” Legner said
Legner’s band, The Wonder Twins, has an interesting story as to how they got their start.
“When Joe and I lived in Central Illinois, we had a very successful band called Cartoon Physics along with our great friends Joe Weisenfelder and Brian Mund,” Legner said. “If you don’t know, ‘cartoon physics’ is a term used to describe the unrealistic physics in the cartoon world. When Wile E. Coyote would chase the Road Runner and mistakenly walk off a cliff, he wouldn’t fall right away. He’d look at the camera, make a face and then fall. That’s the physics of cartoons, and we thought it was a whimsical, quirky name for a band. When we moved to Florida in the fall of 2009, we decided to keep The Wonder Twins going. In fact, our retirement plan is to live and play out together every night on the beaches as a cute, old couple.”
As was mentioned, Legner is a pianist, and she is also known in the community as That Piano Chick.
“To fill my own musical desires while Joe was busy with work and school, I happily fell into the world of dueling pianos in December of 2017, and what a whirlwind journey this has been,” Legner said. “Once I got a taste of the dueling piano world, I knew I wanted to be involved in both solo and dueling pianos. I invested in two gorgeous Dutchgrand baby grand piano shells to help create my own show, which is now featured at JF Kicks in Valrico every first Saturday of the month from 8 until 11 p.m.”
Legner loves that she and The Wonder Twins get to perform for the community.
“I cannot stress enough the amazingness of all the local musicians and establishments that support their local musicians,” Legner said.
To learn more about The Wonder Twins or That Piano Chick, visit Legner’s Facebook pages at facebook.com/TheWonderTwins or facebook.com/ThatPianoChick.
