Sunday, Nov. 24 will be a busy day for the music department as three musical groups will perform their fall concerts in Bjorling Recital Hall.
Dr. Steve Wright will be leading the Adolphus Jazz Ensemble and Gustavus Jazz Lab Band in a concert at 1:30 p.m. The two ensembles will be playing a combination of arrangements of standard tunes and classical jazz pieces that famous musicians have performed before. The performance will have elements of jazz, swing, latin, and ballads. It will be a good mix, according to Wright.
Dr. Karrin Meffert-Nelson will be conducting the Woodwind Chamber Ensembles at 3:30 p.m. The ensemble is composed of a woodwind octet, flute choir, clarinet quartet and two saxophone quartets. There is one musician to each part of music, which “really works well playing on a high level,” Meffert-Nelson said.
Paul Hill will close the night with the Gustavus Percussion Ensemble at 7 p.m. The Gustavus Percussion Ensemble is open to all students regardless of their level of musical experience. Hill finds a way to fit everyone into a piece of music so that the students all get something out of the experience.
“Each time we play a song it might be just a little bit different,” Wright said.
Each piece evolves in style and substance as the concert approaches. Musicians feel what is going on in the piece and make suggestions to the director.
“Unlike many other musical orchestras and ensembles Jazz is not limited to what is on the page,” Wright said.
Jazz relies on improvisation from listening and the musician interpreting what they hear to find out what works or does not work for the next time the piece is played. There is much freedom and improvising in this genre of music.
“The combinations of different instruments bring on an incredible variety of sound., Each instrument has very different colors,” Meffert-Nelson said.
As a way to even out the playing field, Hill chooses musical pieces that no one in the ensemble has done before. “Everyone is starting from scratch regardless of their [musical experience] level,” Hill said.
The Gustavus Percussion Ensemble concert will feature an assortment of music from different time periods and will be accompanied by a variety of sounds.
“Percussion is such a vast thing. There is always going to be variety in concerts” Hill said,
One of the sounds being used for the concert is African rhythms and melodies. The piece will feature an African double bell, also known as a gankogui. It is a high and low bell that are attached and played with a wooden stick.
In another piece entitled, “Just for Buckets,” five students will be playing drum heads on the floor and throwing and rolling the drum heads back and forth in a choreographed fashion.
Looking ahead in the year, the jazz ensembles will be playing at Midnight Express during finals week. The Gustavus Jazz Lab Band will be performing at the Minnesota Music Education Association concert in February. This is the fourth time the band has been picked to perform at this concert. They will also be touring during Spring Break.
The Gustavus Percussion Ensemble will have features in Gustavus Wind Orchestra Concerts, and Vasa Wind Orchestra Concerts throughout the year. The percussionists pick their own college level advanced piece and rehearse it on their own time.
“It gives [percussionists] a chance to show what they can do…it’s their time to shine,” Hill said. They will also be featured during Gustavus Wind Orchestra’s tour.
As for the Woodwind Chamber Ensembles, “A lot of them are in parts of different [musical] groups throughout campus,” Meffert-Nelson said, “This is just another way to do music.”