Waubonsee Community College starting with jazz
Waubonsee Community College will begin its spring series of free concerts with big band music in the tradition of Count Basie and Stan Kenton, as well as some original composing and arranging.
Fresh from performing at the University of Nevada-Reno concert and festival last weekend, the college's jazz band will present a free concert at 7:30 p.m. Friday. The college's steel drum band will perform May 9, and the rock band will perform May 10. All concerts are at 7:30 p.m. in the auditorium on the college's Sugar Grove campus on Route 47 at Waubonsee Drive.
The jazz band will be selling its "Alive and Doing Well" CD at the Friday concert. The disk is also available at the college's bookstore.
"It's the third CD we've recorded in the last 10 years and the first one recorded live," said Jeff Ford, who has directed the jazz band for 20 years. "It's a collection of songs we performed during the 2006-07 school year."
Friday's jazz concert will also feature "Cooler by the Lake," an original composition by Mark Lathan, who is on the music faculty at Waubonsee. The band will also play an arrangement of Chick Corea's "Eternal Child" by band member Matt Erion. Erion's arrangement premiered last weekend when the band performed in Reno.
The jazz band is composed of 22 students ranging in age from 18 to 65. Students audition at the beginning of the school year, and Ford says he has to turn down two or three musicians.
Last fall, the jazz band competed in the Illinois Skyway Collegiate Conference jazz festival and six members received outstanding soloist recognition. They are Walt Howard of Sugar Grove and Paul Cofer of Geneva, who play the tenor saxophone, trumpet player Nate Pritt of DeKalb, Ian Molitor of North Aurora, who plays trombone, Tom Kennedy of Geneva, who plays guitar, and acoustic bass player Esther Espino of Maple Park.
The jazz band was formed 40 years ago when the school was founded.
"The jazz band is one of the earliest student organizations," said Gib Monokoski, music instructor and coordinator of the college's music department. "They perform at a festival every year."
For information on the concerts, call Monokoski at (630) 466-2500.