Purdue News
Purdue News
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March 19, 2004 Trumpeter Bob Lark and four jazz bands to play at 'Super Jazz Jam'WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. – Chicago trumpeter Bob Lark and four bands will fill Stewart Center's Loeb Playhouse with a broad spectrum of jazz during Purdue Bands' Super Jazz Jam at 8 p.m. Saturday, March 27. Tunes by Lennie Niehaus, Sammy Nestico, Duke Ellington, Clifford Brown, George Gershwin and others highlight the free concert featuring Purdue's Studio, Concert, Lab and Jazz bands. Interest in performing jazz has hit a high note on the West Lafayette campus this semester, necessitating the creation of a fourth jazz band, the Studio Jazz Band, says M.T. "Mo" Trout, who directs all four bands. "Many of them are freshmen, and it's a really good learning experience for them." Trout says. "They're doing a very good job." The Super Jazz Jam audience will be treated to top soloists from the various bands, several of whom won outstanding soloist awards at the Elmhurst Jazz Festival in Chicago in early March. Among them is Matt Iles, a freshman from West Lafayette who graduated from Harrison High School. The tenor sax player will be featured in the Quincy Jones/Sammy Nestico tune "Belly Roll" that he performed with the Lab Jazz Band at the competition. For the jam, Trout has purposefully picked a diverse selection of jazz tunes and styles because the makeup of the four bands demand it. "With each band I'll hit a variety of styles," he says. "Big bands tend to take on the personality of the players, so I want to make sure I match that personality with music that complements their talents but stretches them at the same time." The evening's guest artist, trumpeter Bob Lark from the DePaul University jazz faculty, has been associated with the Purdue Jazz Festival for many years. Before the concert he will be working with the Purdue Jazz Band to help Trout finesse their sound prior to going into the studio the following week to record music for an upcoming CD. One of Lark's solo spotlights comes in a comic tune called "Eat and Run" by Howie Smith. "Everything Howie composes is done tongue in cheek," Trout says. "He will take a nursery rhyme and change it into a serious composition, which is what he's done here." Those who listen closely will hear familiar themes from "Three Blind Mice." Performing the tune isn't child's play, however, as it employs "an advanced harmonic thing similar to tunes by John Coltrane," Trout says. Other concert highlights include a version of the popular Duke Ellington tune "Satin Doll" done in Count Basie style to honor the 100th anniversary of Basie's birth. When the Purdue Jazz Band takes the stage as the concert's final band, the spotlight will shift to several student soloists. Alto sax player Jake Noparstak, a junior from Glenview, Ill., will be featured in an up-tempo version of "Back Home Again in Indiana," while pianist and Fort Wayne, Ind., senior Ryan Hicks will be featured in "Body and Soul" by Bob Florence. Drummer and senior Albert Hidalgo, of Elkhart, Ind., is featured in "Leave Us Leap," a tune made famous by the Gene Krupa Orchestra in the mid-1940s. To honor the arrival of spring, Trout gives the spotlight back to Lark for a rendition of George Gershwin's "Summertime" with the Purdue Jazz Band. Writer: Kathy Matter, (765) 496-6785, kcmatter@purdue.edu Source: M.T. Trout, (765) 494-9119, mttrout@purdue.edu Purdue News Service: (765) 494-2096; purduenews@purdue.edu
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