UR Jazz Ensemble and Contemporary Combos

Professor of music and director of the jazz program at Richmond, Dr. Michael Davison, invites you to the coming jazz and contemporary combos concert, a part of the free music series at the University of Richmond. The event will be held on Monday, April 15 in Camp Concert Hall at 7:30p.m, and is free!

The Jazz & Contemporary Combos concert is a lot like Richmond weather: wait 10 minutes, and it will change! The semester’s ending concert – April 15, in Camp Concert Hall – will begin at 7:30 and include six different University of Richmond student groups. Charles Arthur will perform and lead his American Roots Ensemble, showcasing the music of Booker T & the MGs, as well as other early American blues pioneers. Charles will also present his Bluegrass Ensemble, pickin’ and grinnin’ through a few rousing renditions of classic American folk songs. Dr. David Esleck leads showcase two jazz combos: The Black & White Band and The Checkerboards. These two groups will perform a mix of swing, bebop and fusion. The Black & White Band will perform Claude Bolling’s Suite for Flute and Jazz Piano. This is a classical work, composed in a jazz style, featuring Katherine Cook on flute. A new addition to the concert this year, will be the UR Post-Fusion Ensemble, led by bass instructor, Randall Pharr. The group will perform post-60s jazz music - jazz mixed with rock, Latin, R&B and funk. Randall will perform bass with this group. Once again, I will perform and lead my student ensemble, the Little Big Band, through a couple of Latin jazz favorites. Don’t miss this concert. It showcases a wide range of talents by many University of Richmond students.

See you on April 15th. Check the weather before you leave home!

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Distinguished trumpeter Dr. Michael Davison is a University of Richmond Music Professor and Director of Jazz Ensemble. Davison is a legendary performer, respected professor, published composer, and ethnomusicologist. Davison’s love of music has shaped his life and career. He is in demand across the country as a classical and jazz performer and educator. As a performer, he has given jazz and classical recitals all over the United States as well as in parts of France, the Netherlands, Spain, South Africa, China and Cuba. Davison has recorded four jazz CDs as both a leader and sideman. His classical CD, Fenster, received rave reviews from the International Trumpet Guild Journal. Widely considered an expert in Cuban music, he performs and teaches Cuban music at the University of Richmond and worldwide. As a jazz musician, Davison has performed with the late tenor saxophonist and 11-time Grammy winner, Michael Brecker, popular jazz trombonist, Curtis Fuller and legendary Latin jazz saxophonist and composer, Justo Almario. He has also performed alongside some of Motown’s most iconic singers and groups, including Natalie Cole, Aretha Franklin, the Temptations and The Four Tops. As a classical musician, Davison has performed with Rhythm and Brass, a group that plays everything from Bach to Pink Floyd. He has performed with the Wisconsin and Whitewater Brass Quintets, the Rochester Philharmonic, Wisconsin Symphony, Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, and the Richmond Symphony. Davison has performed for Pope John II and George Leonard Carey, Archbishop of Canterbury.

Global Sounds

 Visiting Assistant Professor Dr. Paul Yoon previews the Global Sounds performance on Saturday, April 13, 2013 at 3:00 p.m. The event is free and will be hosted in the University of Richmond Greek Theater. 

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The university context is artificial, not in the sense that it is “false,” but rather because it synthetically concentrates a great diversity of artistic, scientific, literary, and philosophical brilliance in one place.  This artificiality is something to be embraced, because the “real world” rarely affords such vast opportunities for exploration or discovery in a singular locale.  The encounter with diversity and difference challenges our assumptions so that we might expand our perspective and strengthen our grasp.  The Global Sounds Concert on Saturday, April 13, is the kind of “world music” showcase one might find solely on a university campus.  At this concert you will find gathered musical ensembles representing Brazilian samba; vocal and instrumental sitar music from northern India; drumming traditions from the Ewe, who live in Ghana; the gongs of the Balinese gamelan; and taiko drums from Japan.  After the show, audience members will have a chance to hit the drums and gamelan and talk to the performers face to face.  And nearly all the performers are University of Richmond students or live in the Richmond area.  

One difference you might encounter at the Global Sounds Concert is the close relationship between dance and music.  In truth, the combination of dance and music is more common around the world than not, and it is really Western concert halls that are the exception.  Dance will be a central component to both the Indian and Balinese performances.  The costuming is vibrant, and every gesture has deep cultural significance.  The Japanese taiko drumming will also incorporate more elaborate choreography than one might be accustom to in a “music” performance.  

Some of the sounds, such as the Samba ensemble, will be more familiar and recognizable.  Others will be much more densely complex than expected.  The Ewe drumming, for instance, incorporates deeply interlocking, polymetric rhythms that are significantly more elaborate than those found in Western musics.  Still other sounds will be much more curious.  The Balinese gamelan, for example, uses an entirely unique scale system.  Also, each instrument of the gamelan comes in pairs such that one instrument of the pair is slightly out of tune with the other instrument.  When both instruments simultaneously strike the same note, this out-of-tuneness creates a “shimmering” effect that is very much a part of the Balinese aesthetic.  

The outdoor Greek Theater (weather permitting) provides a more relaxed atmosphere compared to the concert hall, and this is closer to the performance context for many of these traditions.  This is always a wonderful show, and we hope to see you there.

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Paul Yoon is Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of Music.  His work primarily focuses on Asian American politics and music making practices, and he received his Ph.D. from Columbia University.  Yoon is currently the director of River City Taiko.