The jazz band dressed in black and red for their concert Tuesday night.
“Black is formal, and it’s kind of Christmas…That’s why it’s black with a splash of red,” said David McClune, alto saxophone player, leader of jazz band and professor of music.
The jazz band, made up of students inside and outside of the music department, professors and guest performers, perform a concert each semester.
The atmosphere was informal, as McClune interacted with the audience using questions, calls and answers and jokes. Band members spoke and joked with one another and members of the audience sang along.
The band started out with “Quiet Breaker” by Sammy Nestico. After this piece, they played “Bare Necessities” by Terry Gilkyson. This song is originally from the Disney film “The Jungle Book,” but the arrangement the band played was arranged for Harry Connick Jr. Barry DeCoursey, a music major, sung this song.
The next song was “Channel One Suite” by Bill Reddie. This song was originally played by Buddy Rich.
“Buddy Rich was considered the best jazz drummer on earth,” McClune said.
Ryan Nelson, a music education major, followed in Rich’s footsteps by playing the drums for this challenging piece.
Next the band played “Dancing Queen” by ABBA. McClune asked the audience to sing along with the Swedish disco hit.
“I know you sing in the shower,” McClune said, encouraging the audience to join.
Next was a piece from “Children of Sanchez,” an enormously successful movie score for an enormously unsuccessful movie, McClune said.
After “March of the Toys,” a song from the Christmas musical “Babes in Toyland,” McClune thanked physics professor Bill Nettles, who plays trombone in the band, for showing up and fixing the sound system that was previously mangled.
The band played “I Won’t Dance,” and then cool jazz song “Jeru.” To illustrate what cool jazz feels like, McClune took a deep breath, and exhaled through a smile.
DeCoursey and Kaitlyn Pindack, a music education major, accompanied Cameron Skonhovd, a psychology and sociology double major as the jazz band played the 1982 song “Africa” by Toto. The audience sang along to this song as well.
After “Jingle Bells” by James Pierpont and “Salsa for Normon” by Miguel Blanco, the band finished the concert to a standing ovation.
