Purdue Jazz Band's 'Now & Then' to explore 100 years of jazz

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - Audience members will be able to travel through 11 decades of jazz during the Purdue Jazz Band's "Now & Then" concert at 8 p.m. Friday (Oct. 20) in Stewart Center's Loeb Playhouse.

The jazz band will be joined by Purdue's newest performing ensemble, the Boiler Hot Club, for a free concert that will include tunes from 1902's Dixieland version of "Five Foot Two, Eyes of Blue" to 2005's modern jazz piece "Attack of the Killer Tomatoes." The eight-member Boiler Hot Club is fashioned after the Dixieland bands that were the forerunners of jazz.

The concert will include one of the widest-ranging concerts Purdue's jazz bands has ever presented, and "you'll find the same pervasive fun-loving spirit in all of them," said Purdue Jazz Band director M.T. "Mo" Trout. The concert will feature such tunes as "St. James Infirmary" (earliest versions from 1899), "Bugle Call Rag" (1923), "Basie Boogie," (1941), "I Get a Kick Out of You," (1957), "Too Close For Comfort," (1976), "One for My Baby" (1994) and "Fiesta Bahia" (2005).

"There are many styles of big band jazz but three primary compositional trends, and it all starts with New Orleans jazz and the Dixieland style," Trout said. "Dixieland bands were created to fill a musical void in the African-American community and provide entertainment. In many ways, they copied the upbeat style of the famous concert bands of the time."

In the late 1800s and early 1900s, the early jazz musicians were self-taught and didn't play from written music. Instead they learned tunes "by ear," by listening to others play them, Trout said. The style of the day was "collective improvisation, which means that everyone was improvising at the same time," he said.

Trumpets always played a version of the melody line, Trout said.

"The other instruments all knew what their function was and provided it in improvisational mode," he said. "Trombones provided harmonic support and woodwinds added the obligato. That style has continued into Dixieland today. Our music is somewhat more arranged but all of the musicians still improvise throughout."

Legendary trumpeter Louis Armstrong typifies aspects of the second major style of jazz as performances evolved to offering soloists a spotlight.

"There was more space for individuals to take longer solos," Trout said.

Bigger bands started to enter the scene as well and groups of instruments demanded a different level of musical organization, he said. According to Trout, things changed rapidly as more and more white musicians were drawn to jazz and music started to be written down.

"With the larger groups of instruments in a band, the style that emerged featured groups of like instruments always playing together as sections interspersed with the individual solos," he said.

One of the tunes to be played during the concert, "Bugle Call Rag," is believed to have come from the music book of the Fletcher Henderson Big Band, one of the earliest big bands dating to 1923. The tune was later made famous by the Benny Goodman Band, which bought Fletcher's music book and adopted Fletcher's swinging style of presentation.

Trout said Duke Ellington serves as a great example of the third main style of jazz "in which compositions are more orchestral in nature with different combinations of sounds and instruments, giving each tune a unique sound."

"Most writers today use a combination of styles," he said.

Trout said the one element that ties all of jazz history together is the sense of fun that colors it.

"From its beginnings, jazz music was entertainment," he said. "It wasn't trying to be art. It was just music people could enjoy listening and dancing to."

As part of the evening's short exploration of jazz history, the Purdue Jazz Band will present a group of new arrangements of jazz fusion selections by the group Steely Dan including "Bodhisattva," "The Goodbye Look" and "Do It Again." Steely Dan reached the height of its popularity in the 1970s but churned out hits during three decades with its studio recordings.

Trout said the group's "interesting melodies and sophisticated approach struck a chord, particularly with jazz musicians. Fred Sturm, former director of jazz studies at the Eastman School of Music presents a modern jazz approach in these big band arrangements, yet keeps the spirit of Steely Dan alive."

The "Now & Then" concert is the first of many jazz concerts throughout the 2006-07 season. The next event is "The Unforgettable Glenn Miller" with the American Music Repertory Ensemble and Lab Jazz Band on Oct. 27 in Loeb Playhouse. All the department's jazz bands have a concert scheduled on Nov. 17, also in Loeb.

Writer: Kathy Matter, Purdue Bands public relations director, (765) 496-6785, kcmatter@purdue.edu

Purdue News Service: (765) 494-2096; purduenews@purdue.edu

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Purdue University Bands

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