Big band concert launches MacEwan season

When University of Alberta’s Dr. Tom Dust looks back on the 15 years he’s conducted jazz band concerts in partnership with MacEwan University, there’s a note of pride in his voice.

“We’re hearing music performed by some of the best young musicians in the Edmonton area. And it’s often not accessible by any other means,” Dust says.

Every year the music education professor pairs up with a MacEwan music instructor to launch one of the most exciting big band concerts of the season. This year, his compadre is Kent Sangster, acting head of MacEwan’s woodwind department.

The duo auditioned students from both campuses and divided them into two bands for a one-day engagement on Monday, Dec. 5 at the John L. Haar Theatre in the MacEwan Centre for the Arts.

Dust is conducting Big Band 2 and has amassed 18 instrumentalists and a vocalist, Stephanie Savage, an alumna of St. Albert Children’s Theatre. In addition, he has brought in Bellerose High grad Keat Machtemes as a fifth trombone.

Opening the concert is Stan Kenton’s Street of Dreams, a technical challenge for the five trombones and sax section.

“The tempo is extremely slow and difficult for less experienced musicians. Instead of starting with something easy, they have to have their game face on from the first downbeat.”

Savage, now in her second year with the band, picks it up with a Frank Sinatra arrangement of It’s Only a Paper Moon, and Somewhere Over the Rainbow, one of the great markers of American pop.

“She has an excellent range and tremendous belt power. She’s also able to go into a softer, lighter voice with great ease. She has great command of the instrument. She also has a musical theatre background, and from that has developed the ability to tell a story.”

Part of Dust’s choice of Paper Moon was a challenge to sax players to improve their woodwind doubling skills.

“In a professional band, they also have to play flute and clarinet and they’ll be doing that.”

In jazz bands, the rhythm section usually just plays fills while the brass bathes in the spotlight. But in Aaron Parks’ Riddle Me This, the rhythm section takes centre stage.

As part of the contemporary slate, the musicians will play one of Gordon Goodwin’s recent numbers.

“There’s the Rub is a funk chart. It’s very intricate. It’s a long chart which makes it a challenging length and it has tricky syncopation for the band to learn.”

The grand finale is a Buddy Rich chart, Big Swing Face, a fairly up-tempo, flat-out swing blues. The tempo is quick as the rhythm section lays out the best groove while the brass is taxed into sustaining the melody.

“This is exciting music and a chance to hear live music unlike any other. There are very few professionally rehearsed big bands, even fewer than symphonies. And this is such a wonderful opportunity to benefit from a rehearsed band.”