500 students to participate in jazz festival at River Campus

Southeast Missouri State University’s River Campus will host a two-day jazz festival on Feb. 3 and 4 in the Donald C. Bedell Performance Hall at the River Campus.

The performances on Friday, Feb. 3 will be from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m and Saturday, Feb. 4 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

More than 500 high-school and middle-school students from the surrounding area will participate in the festival.

“We’ll bring about 500 student musicians to our campus (as we do each and every year) to see what Southeast has to offer and to hear our college jazz ensembles. Many of the bands who come for our ‘during the day’ festival stay for our Friday evening concert,” Robert Conger, professor of music at Southeast said.

There will also be a guest artist, James Pisano, a jazz saxophonist and classical clarinet player.

“We also bring in a special jazz guest artist every year to inspire and teach the younger musicians about jazz, jazz improvisation, and the field of music,” Conger said.

Jazz ensemble plays Donald C. Bedell Performance Hall in 2014.Photo by Elizabeth Munier

Along with the high-school and middle-school students and guest artist Southeast’s jazz ensemble and jazz lab band will perform. It will be performing selections from the Count Basie classic “Front Burner” and “Ok with Jay” from the Buddy Rich library.

Pisano will play compositions from American jazz saxophonist Don Menza and he will also play several pieces with the studio jazz ensemble, which include Count Basie’s “Corner Pocket,” Latin original “A Night in Havana” and Frank Mantooth’s original “Council Groove Groove.”

“We want to give back to the public school music programs in our area. By providing our excellent performance hall (Bedell) for them to perform and be adjudicated by professionals in the field, we are assisting them in improving their level of musicianship,” Conger said.

Admission will be free for the Clark Terry PMA Jazz Festival, which takes place on Feb. 3. Admission for the Jazz Festival Gala Concert will be $12.

Tickets for the gala concert can be purchased by visiting the River Campus Box Office located at 518 S. Fountain St. during the hours of 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday, via the website RiverCampusEvents.com or by calling (573) 651-2265.