'Warhorses' Offered at USU Big Band Concert

Utah State University Big Bands present the annual fall concert Monday, Oct. 7, at 7:30 p.m. in the Caine Performance Hall on USU’s Logan campus. The performance features two big bands — the Jazz Orchestra and the Jazz Ensemble. Jon Gudmundson, director of jazz studies, directs the orchestra, while Greg Wheeler, professor and assistant director of jazz studies, directs the jazz ensemble.

“The USU Jazz Orchestra will perform classic big band arrangements, including Neal Hefti’s Cute, Sammy Nestico’s Splanky and Ralph Burns’ Early Autumn,” Gudmundson said. “Each of these arrangements can be considered a ‘warhorse,’ in that they have been performed countless times by countless big bands over the years because they are among the finest exemplars of classic big band writing, ever.”

Larry Smith, tenor saxophonist and professor emeritus, will be a special guest soloist at this fall’s concert.

“Smith leads his own big band, the Kicks Big Band, as well as the Larry Smith Jazz Orchestra, and he continues to write prodigiously for big bands,” Gudmundson said. “At this concert we will hear two of Smith’s arrangements and as an added bonus, the USU Jazz Orchestra will perform Michael Brecker’s Renaissance Man, arranged by one of Larry Smith’s many former students, Ryan Conger.”

The USU Jazz Ensemble will also perform some “warhorse” tunes from the past, Wheeler said.

“These include a tune from the Count Basie library written by Sammy Nestico entitled Prime Time,” Wheeler said. “We’ll also feature guest soloist Smith on tenor saxophone in a special Manny Mendelson arrangement of Victor Young’s Stella by Starlight. The band will liven up the evening’s program with a Les Hooper funk arrangement of Chicken Polo.”

Tickets for the Big Bands performance are $10 adults, $8 seniors and youth, $5 USU faculty and staff and free for USU students with ID. For more information or tickets, visit the CCA Box Office in room L101 of the Chase Fine Arts Center on USU’s Logan campus, call 435-797-8022 or see the college’s Production Services website.

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Writer and contact: Whitney Schulte, 435-797-9203, whitney.schulte@usu.edu