Jazz

I’ve been a bit slow at reporting on Monday nights fabulous outing. The Squalicum High School Jazz band, for which my daughter plays tenor sax, was selected to participate in a project sponsored by KPLU, a Seattle area public radio station. The project was the creation of “School of Jazz 2”, a CD which features 12 high school jazz bands performing with professional artists. Monday night was the CD Release Party, at Benaroya Hall in Seattle, which really was a concert with the bands playing live the songs they recorded. Here’s the full info including the poster/CD art by Nancy Pearson (above picture)

http://www.kplu.org/schoolofjazz.html

There was room for parents to ride along in the charter bus with the musicians, what a treat not having to drive, park and fight the Seattle traffic. Of course instead of leaving at 3:30 we left at 4:00 because one young man forgot to bring his dress pants and we had to wait for his mother to bring them. This cut into our dinner break time at the Westlake Center, just time for a quick bite, no time for shopping.

Benaroya Hall is in downtown Seattle, it’s where the Seattle Symphony plays, though we were in one of the “smaller” theaters. As you go up the stairs you are walking under a huge glass chandelier created by Dale Chihuly. For a very poor picture of the chandelier and info on it

http://www.seattlesymphony.org/benaroya/about/art.aspx

The kids were pretty nervous, several of the other high schools that were playing have national recognition. But they held their own and the applause they received had to be more than just our Bellingham contingent. It was an exciting evening of great jazz music.

Unfortunately the ride home didn’t go as smooth, we got caught in some freeway construction which added 30 minutes to the trip and didn’t get us back until midnight. I was very tired the next day.