UIC’s Jazz Concert

On February 15th, University of Illinois at Chicago held a jazz concert with a special

guest saxophonist, Chris Potter. Jazz has a distinct stylistic evolution. It evolved in New Orleans,

is rooted in African American’s traditions, and is a music without limit where every player can

express their emotions in their own way, with their own tunes. In other words – Jazz is

improvisation.

In my past, I have attended a couple symphony band concerts, but I have never been to a

jazz concert. When our professor told us we will be attending a mandatory jazz concert for this

class, I did not like the idea of it. To me, jazz concert was just a bunch of noises from a bunch of

instruments. Even ten minutes before the concert, I was standing outside the door waiting with a

pen and a notebook in my hand so I could take notes and leave. However as soon as I walked in,

it was an entirely different atmosphere from what I was expecting. Unlike the other concerts I

attended, there was a small audience of about 200 people, all chairs facing towards the stage of

course. I was amazed to see the audience. The entire room was well attended, with mostly

college students and couples. The room did not look too large from my perspective; giving me a

closer and more connected feel to the band. As people started walking in, I noticed everyone was

wearing causal clothes, and it all seemed so relaxing and comfortable, however the musicians
were dressed formally in suits. The crowd and the musicians were very diverse in age, culture as

well as in race. The lights were dim on the audience and the spotlight was on the stage. On the

top stage, there were four musicians who were playing the trumpets, followed by three people on

the bottom stage playing trombones. There was one guy playing the guitar, one was playing the

piano, and the other played the drums. Not just this, but there was flute, clarinet and different

types of saxophones. As soon as it was 6:59, I knew I was in for one hell of a ride. And as it

turned out, I was right.

The band I observed had two different sections to it. In the first section, the UIC Jazz

Ensemble played three songs ‘Lion and the Lamb’, ‘Leaving’, and ‘Detour Ahead’ directed by

Andy Baker. ‘Lion and the Lamb’ is written by John Wojciechowski. It started out with the

trumpets of three different melodies, followed by a few piano keys. It was soft and slow at first,

but after a couple repetitive notes, the song picked up and the drums started playing. The

saxophone came in next, and as soon as I heard it play, it instantly became my favorite

instrument. The syncopated melody for all the songs made it hard for me to count the bars. In

class, when our professor is counting the bars, he makes it look so easy and it is easy to follow

his hand motions in identifying the harmony of the song. However, when I was trying to count

the bars for each song, I realized it wasn’t that easy since all the instruments were played

together and I did not know which beat to count to. The second song in this section was
‘Leaving’, written by Richie Beirach and arranged by Jim McNeely. From this section, this was

from favorite song, because of the soft beats and Pirtle’s amazing voice. What I found really

interesting was that the singer didn’t greet anyone when she came to the stage. It was almost like

she was keeping her voice a surprise till her first verse of the song. I could feel the excitement in

the crowd to hear what her voice would be like. I was expecting a thick, opera-like voice but I

could not be more wrong. Her voice was very delicate, soft, and beautiful. You could see her

passion on her face, and not just her but all the musicians looked very passionate and ardent