Concert Report #1-Harris, Aniyah
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Kennesaw State University *
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Dec 6, 2023
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Aniyah Harris
Concert Report #1 (Bailey School of Music)
Professor Dolan
October 2
nd
, 2024
Concert Report #1
One of the Bailey School of Music concerts, Jazz Ensembles I and II, was performed on
October 2
nd
at 7:30 p.m. This performance was located at the Morgan Center Hall at the Bailey
Performance Center. The conductors are Sam Skelton and Wes Funderburk. The KSU Jazz
Ensemble II was conducted by Wes Funderbunk while the KSU Jazz Ensemble II was performed
by Sam Skelton. I chose to go to their jazz concert simply from having the love for jazz music.
My grandparents always played Jazz around my siblings and I growing up. So, I felt as if I would
actually enjoy this particular concert than the other options. I was looking forward to them
sounding great and beautiful and give the room a vibe of jazz.
For the first half of the concert, the KSU Jazz Ensemble II played five songs with
instruments like the saxophone, piano, trumpet, trombone, bass, violins, guitars, and drums. The
first song,
All of Me
by Marks and Simon, was the introduction of the jazz concert. The song was
mainly played by a saxophone and the drums. The meter in the song was a simple quadruple, a
4/4 throughout the piece. The rhythm was slightly upbeat, it stayed the same throughout. The
music consisted more of consonance notes as they played notes that created beautiful harmony
during the chorus of the piece. I thought the song was decent, but I was honestly looking forward
to something more enjoyable later on in the concert. The next song they played was
Willow Weep
for Me
by Ann Ronnel, arr. Bob Brookmeyer. This song definitely had a lot of dissonance
harmony that I did not enjoy. I think it was played in a minor key. It seemed like the eerie
harmonies was the point of this particular piece so I would give them credit for playing it well.
This was honestly my least favorite song of the night though. The melody and rhythm kept
changing from a decent sounded upbeat tune to a slow depressing one.
The third song of the night had a solo, Laila Garthe, who song the lyrics to the piece
called
Come in From the Rain
originally written by Melissa Manchester in 1975. There was a
solo trumpet from Mr. Ross for the song. This song had a rhythmic ostinato all throughout. The
rhythm was repeated constantly with a soothing tune. I noticed some word painting between the
solo and the trumpet player. Whenever the soloist would get louder with her vocals singing
“Come in From the Rain,” the trumpet player followed pursuit with his notes by crescendoing
and progressing. I thought this piece was very nice with the soloist who had a very beautiful
voice. The second to last song was
Fly Me to the Moon,
written by Bart Howard and composed
by Quincy Jones in 1954. The vocalist for this song was a guy name Anthony Smith. The last
song of the KSU Jazz Ensemble II was called
Yesterday
by McCartney and Lennon, arranged by
Mike Barone. A guy name Nico Gonzalez arranged the song playing a saxophone. It had a very
soothing tune to it. The saxophone’s arrangement reinforces the song's air of sadness. This song
was polyphonic as it had more than one melody and harmony to the song that was given by the
drums, saxophone, and guitars. This was my favorite song of the first half of the concert. I
enjoyed the first half of the concert and was eager for the second half.
The next half of the concert was KSU’s Jazz Ensemble I that played music that was “Mid
Century Modern,” conducted by Sam Skelton. The first song was called
Freedom Jazz Dance
by
Eddie Harris, arranged by Bill Stapleton in 1964. There was a saxophone soloist in the song, but
he was not named by his conductor. This song was definitely polyphonic as several melodies
were played throughout the song. It was great to hear as they all played so well together. The
rhythm was upbeat and fast which quite impressed me by how fast each student played their
instrument so well for this particular piece. The intervals were consonant in this piece and the
meter was a quadruple meter. I was amazed by their performance for this song of playing so
many melodies at the same time. It reminded me of the theme song from the show, “The Cosby
Show.” The second song was
Ecaroh
by Horace Silver, arranged by Rob McConnell. This was
composed in 1975. An interesting fact about this song was that the title
Ecaroh
is actually Horace
Silver name backwards. Him and his friends had a habit of calling each other by their names
backwards back then. This was more homophonic as the
music had one sound of melody being
played by multiple instruments at the same time
.
It sounded like they went up an octave during
the middle of the song then went back down. The rhythm was upbeat with a quadruple meter as it
played four beats per measure. I thought this piece was nice. I noticed at this point majority of
their songs in this concert was played by the saxophone heavy as a soloist at one point in
majority of the songs played.
The next song they played was
I’ve Got the World on a String
by Harold Arlen, arranged
by Ted Koehler. The soloist for the vocals for this peace was Sammy Giron. This song had a
rhythmic ostinato all throughout as well. It started and ended with a homophonic texture. The
song was played in a major key. I thought the song was nice, the moderate upbeat rhythm never
changed so it was the same tune that I had liked listening to. The vocal soloist sounded great for
this piece. I believed they chose the right person for this kind of song which made the music
even better. The last song they played for the night was
Final Analysis
by Don Ellis. This song
had a polyphonic texture. Some parts of the song had a homophonic texture between the pianist
and the drum player. It was hard to find the meter to the song as the beat kept switching up all
throughout the song. I’d say the meter switched from a triple to a quadruple as it changed. The
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main instruments played here were the drums, piano, guitar, and saxophone. The rhythm was
bright and upbeat. The music felt happy. My favorite part of the song were the instruments
playing in a homophonic texture. The piano played a very nice melody that I enjoyed hearing.
The overall performance was really good. This performance made me start to love
saxophones as they play so pretty to jazz music. I think the saxophone soloists played very well.
I almost thought we were watching professionals play the instrument. I appreciated the vocal
soloists giving us information about the songs they were about to sing. We were able to gain a
little knowledge of the music which was cool. The conductors shouted out the vocal soloists and
the student soloists playing the instruments for each piece before and after. There wasn’t much
communication between the performers on stage. For the first half of the performance, the
audience applauded the most for Anthony Smith towards his solo for the song
Fly Me to the
Moon,
written by Bart Howard and composed by Quincy Jones.
I believe this was because of his
confidence and dance moves he added with his performance. His voice was amazing for the song
which I can say a lot of people in the audience agreed on based on their applause. I noticed they
applaud the least for
Willow Weep for Me
by Ann Ronnel, arranged by Bob Brookmeyer. The
song sounded sad for the most part so that could explain the audience’s response to this. The
audience was very supportive for the performers for each song they played which I loved since
that could give the performances a feel of doing great with the songs they worked hard for.
Overall, everyone did a great job, and I enjoyed the benefits of joining this class to discover very
talented students here at KSU at the Bailey School of Music. I would definitely come back next
year for the next jazz concert.
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