Saturday July 20, 3:00 PM
Preston Hall
“When you hear how great these young kids play, you know the future of our music is in good hands.” – Thelonius Monk, Jr. (monkinstitute.org)
Miles Berry, 18, New Orleans Center for Creative Arts – tenor saxophone
Joel Ross, 17, Chicago High School for the Arts – vibes
Nick Saia, 17, LaGuardia High School of Music & Art, NYC – guitar
James Francies, 17, High School for the Performing &Visual Arts, Houston – piano
Jose Albizu, 17, New World School of the Arts, Miami – bass
Michael Mitchell, 18, Booker T. Washington High School for the Arts, Dallas – drums
The Institute’s National Performing Arts High School Program has been designed to facilitate the education of gifted music students who are currently attending public performing arts high schools across the nation. The Program offers these students the opportunity to participate in a pre-conservatory, highly specialized performance-based jazz curriculum, study with some of the world’s most eminent jazz artists and educators, perform in a jazz combo composed of their peers, and prepare for entry into the country’s most distinguished conservatories and university schools of music. Included is instruction in Jazz Improvisation, Theory, Composition, History, and Styles and Analysis. The Institute works with each school in developing jazz curricula and instructional methodology; provides ongoing private and group instruction with Institute teaching staff and visiting artists and educators; offers special residences with jazz masters; and arranges high-profile performance opportunities for the student ensembles.
The best of the best were selected to participate in the Institute’s 2013 Peer-to-Peer Jazz Education Program. Through this national initiative, the Institute invites jazz combos comprising music students from the country’s leading public performing arts high schools to participate in weeklong peer-to-peer jazz informance tours. The young musicians gain invaluable performance experience playing alongside internationally acclaimed artists. At the same time, they help educate young audiences in public schools throughout the United States about America’s indigenous musical art form. The students play and talk about jazz, teaching their peers not only about the music and its rich history, but also about the deeply held American values it represents: teamwork, unity with ethnic diversity, democracy, and the vital importance of really listening to one another.
Thelonious Monk Institute National Performing Arts High School Jazz Program Participants
Arts High School, Newark, NJ
Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts, Dallas
Chicago High School for the Arts
Duke Ellington School of the Arts, Washington, DC
Gallery 37 Center for the Arts, Chicago
High School for the Performing and Visual Arts, Houston
LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts, New York
Los Angeles County High School for the Arts
New Orleans Center for Creative Arts
New World School of the Arts, Miami
Ramón C. Cortines School of Visual and Performing Arts, Los Angeles