The Year in Jazz Highlights Community

Terence Blanchard and John Petrucelli during jazz rehearsal break
Photo by John Edwin Mason

Music major and saxophonist Gregory Weaver gave a senior recital this spring semester that drew heavily upon his experiences as a jazz musician during his time at the University. He assembled eleven friends and musicians for the event and called the group the Greg Weaver Jazz Congregation. The congregation gathered together for one, special night in March and celebrated their friendship over the past four years and the music that had grown in tandem with it. Weaver’s group gathered together to worship, as his language suggests, and they did so at the altar of jazz.

The congregation’s performance ostensibly appears to be an isolated event, the flickering of a flame of friendship in the emotionally charged months leading up to graduation. In reality, the recital coincided with The McIntire Department of Music’s “Year in Jazz,” a yearlong celebration of the deep and vibrant jazz community in the Charlottesville area. Just as Weaver gathered his closest collaborators for his swan song, the department spent an enormous amount of effort this year bringing professional musicians from across the nation to the University to share their art with the Charlottesville community. The department invited student musicians, in particular, to learn from the shared musical experiences of these masters by working closely with them. Jazz greats such as Terence Blanchard, Richie Cole, and Royce Campbell graced the stage in Old Cabell Hall this past year, inviting the community to come together and sing as one. Local musicians also showed a renewed presence in the department this year, as the Free Bridge Quintet and University Jazz Ensemble collaborated with close friends and colleagues such as Mike Rosensky, Stephanie Nakasian, Nathan Dishman, and the Blackout Project. With these professionals as examples, students learned that while a community sometimes develops by happenstance, it often must be forged by the conscious efforts of individuals.

The department began its yearlong celebration of jazz community by bringing in Richie Cole, an old friend and colleague from the northeast, for a concert and residency sponsored by Karen and Steve Petrucelli. Working with the University’s own jazz ensemble, Cole offered an unparalleled amount of enthusiasm and energy to students. He emphasized the joyful aspect of playing: one rehearsal had the saxophonist dancing and shouting in an attempt to elicit the proper emotion from the ensemble’s playing. To his credit, no rehearsal has ever ended late with so many student musicians smiling.

The concert also served as a welcome opportunity for Cole to reunite with two long lost friends: director John D’earth and student tenor player John Petrucelli. Cole became close to D’earth as a fellow-participant in New York jam sessions during the seventies, and the elder saxophonist taught a young Petrucelli throughout the nineties.

A former student entered into maturity in the presence of his mentor.

Two old friends and colleagues were reunited at long lost.

Cole’s time at the university showed that the bonds forged by music transcend time as well as distance.

The Jazz Ensemble’s spring concert brought in close friends The Blackout Project for an evening of dance music. Despite the fact that the performance was entitled “Let’s Dance!” it appeared, from the outset, that the very command was doomed to result in nothing more than private toe tapping. D’earth originally conceived of the concert as a way to show jazz’s origins as dance-hall music, but budgetary constraints prevented the ensemble from securing a venue suitable for dancing. Forced to perform in Old Cabell Hall as usual, the musicians had lingering fears that no one would find the courage to dance in a venue meant for polite concertgoers.

Even so, the ensemble rode a wave of energy throughout the show that the crowd could not help but become swept up in. This was due, in no small part, to the close collaboration with The Blackout Project; the hip-hop group’s performance yielded a spontaneous standing ovation mid-concert. Later that night, a single, adventurous pair found their way onstage and danced aggressively during “Sing, Sing, Sing.” They were quickly joined by another pair, and, by the end of the night, a crowd of people danced in a conga line from one end of the hall to the other. The collaboration with The Blackout Project offered students the unique opportunity to stretch themselves musically into a genre that they may not have otherwise encountered, and the experiment proved explosive for the audience. The energy that grew out of the cross-genre collaboration gave some listeners the courage to get out of their seats and transcend social norms.

Any wrap-up of a year in jazz would be remiss without mentioning the efforts of the University’s jazz faculty, and in this regard the season drew a pair of powerful performances from The Free Bridge Quintet. In October, Royce Campbell stepped in to fill in for John Abercrombie in a guest performance with the quintet when the scheduled artist could not perform due to sudden illness. In true, jazz fashion, the six musicians adapted with poise and delivered a concert at the last moment that maintained the high level of excellence set in recent years. The group’s spring concert featured another exciting collaboration between the group and a number of their performance faculty colleagues, old and new: Guitarist Mike Rosensky, vocalist Stephanie Nakasian, and trombonist Nathan Dishman. This rousing performance served as a reminder that the department does not necessarily have to travel afield to find world-class musicians.

The residency by contemporary jazz luminary and Grammy-award winning trumpeter Terence Blanchard served as the crown jewel of the department’s season. Blanchard spent three days working closely with students in March in master classes and workshops. He offered unique insight into the film scoring process in a colloquium on jazz in film by discussing the inspiration behind one of his collaborations with Spike Lee. The trumpeter’s residency culminated in a concert that drew from his breadth of experience as both a film composer and an advocate for New Orleans’s reconstruction. Students joined Blanchard in the performance of a trio of compositions that paid tribute to classic jazz scores from the past five decades, as well as a pair of selections from his Grammy Award winning requiem for Hurricane Katrina, A Tale of God’s Will.

Blanchard’s presence deeply touched the lives of the student musicians who worked with him during his time at the University; he seemed to have something inspirational to say to each person present, if they would only listen. Drawing on his own experiences as a young trumpet player heavy on talent but light on motivation, Blanchard suggested that anyone could develop to his level given the right amount of drive. This moment of humility quickly gave way, however, to a stern rebuke, a challenge: how dare the students not practice and deny the world the beautiful music that could be made. This poignantly delivered anecdote struck a chord in the hearts of many of the students present, as any student musician struggles to stay motivated in the face of the overwhelming amount of material still left to be absorbed.

Blanchard also emphasized the communal aspect of music making, speaking from his own experiences as an advocate for the reconstruction of New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Good musicians were good people, he offered, and suggested that the connection between an artist and his community is vital to the vitality of each. In this regard, the year in jazz did not occur only in the classroom or the concert hall, but it also spilled over into the streets of Charlottesville as well. The student jazz chamber ensembles performed their usual trio of concerts, but they also infused the community with their talents. In the past year, student groups performed for Take Back the Night, the University of Virginia Art Museum, the Virginia Foundation, a holiday festival in Barracks Road Shopping Center, College Inn, and for local fraternities.

The mere fact that students performed in the community does not reflect anything unusual; the department’s jazz faculty has always sought out opportunities for their students to perform in the area. Instead, this year saw students attempting to stake their own claim in the local musical territory. Thursday Night at Millers has long been a jazz fixture, and occasionally local musicians will bring their instruments to sit in and play with the group. For many student musicians, however, performing in this atmosphere is too intensely professional. A void existed: students needed a place to train with each other, a laboratory for experimenting with each other and developing their nascent skills before moving on to the professional circuit.

Acting on Blanchard’s advice, students sought to create a forum for their own student jazz community. Friday nights at Michael’s Bistro on the corner have stepped in to fill this void and become a safe haven for the future of student jazz. While a core group of student musicians maintain the engagement, any given Friday will see a variety of other performers come and showcase their talents, develop their skills. The result is an exciting new venue for student talent that offers a new forum for student performance, something akin to the legendary scenes of New York, Chicago, and other big cities.

It has been a year resplendent with collaborations and lovely performances celebrating a community already in place. This new proactive attitude marks a positive change in the student mentality as a result of the skills and lessons they learned from visiting artists. Unfortunately, only one year can be officially deemed the “The Year in Jazz.” With the devoted efforts of students and local professionals, however, its effects will be felt for decades to come.

The Year in Jazz was made possible by the Jazz Department Enhancement Fund,
the Muller Endowment, and the Provost's Office Arts Enhancement Fund. The Richie Cole residency was sponsored by Karen and Steve Petrucelli.