January 11, 2006
Tech Jazz Lab Band electrifies TC audience
Michigan Tech Jazz Lab Band performance raises funds for school music boosters program
By Carol South
Herald contributing writer
A different kind of fusion jazz experience hit the City Opera House last Tuesday evening as the Michigan Tech Jazz Lab Band rocked a packed house.
Preceded by the Alumni Band, which featured three West High School grads and one current student, and featuring Bill Sears as a guest performer, the Jazz Lab Band concert drew 250 people. The event also raised $1,400 for Music Boosters' programs, which include scholarships to music students and mini-grants to music teachers.
"It's very gratifying to see this all come together," said Robert DeGabriele, a board member of the Music Boosters who organized the program. "And the audience was just electric, too."
The evening's program, advertising and logistics coalesced shortly after DeGabriele's son, Aaron, a 2005 West High School graduate and a freshman at Tech, contacted his father about a possible clinic at his alma mater. Aaron, a physics major and member of the Jazz Lab Band, would be traveling with the band to schools on the west side of the state as part of a regular outreach program. Mike Irish, the Jazz Lab Band director, wanted to add Traverse City to his list of stops.
Coordinating a 7 a.m. clinic at West for the school's green jazz band last Tuesday morning, DeGabriele also proposed an evening concert as a fund-raiser for the Music Boosters. Things began moving quickly as approvals rolled in and groups stepped up to help. The Northern Michigan Jazz Experience funded the appearance by Sears, the Michigan Tech director of alumni relations notified more than 700 grads in the region and also found a benefactor to cover the jazz band's hotel costs. Posters went up around town and DeGabriele found himself on the radio and calling newspapers plugging the event.
"It was just everybody getting involved," said DeGabriele.
As Tuesday evening approached, organizers were not sure if people would come. Hopefully, they set up the house for 250 attendees - and wound up filling it to capacity.
"I was backstage and couldn't tell how many people were out there and then I walked out and everyone applauded and the place was full, Wow!" recalled DeGabriele, who donned a tux and served as emcee for the evening. "This is superb for a fund-raiser like this."
Honoring local jazz roots and youth, the concert began with the Alumni Band. This four-piece combo featured Aaron DeGabriele on tenor sax, Tyler Blum, a 2004 West grad and Tech student, on alto sax, Rob Rokos, a 2005 West grad studying at Central Michigan University, on percussion and Riley Hagan, a sophomore at West, on bass.
"The real long-term benefit of something like this is to get these kids energized to see that when they leave high school and go to college, they don't have to be a music major to keep playing," said Robert DeGabriele. "To give them that kind of energy, in the long run, that was the best thing."
Parents of any student involved in band, choir or orchestra in the TCAPS system are automatically part of the Music Boosters program. Every fall, the Music Boosters put on the used instrument sale and the Thirlby Field Marching Band Exhibition.
Various fund-raisers also provide the non-profit organization with money to help music teachers and students. This year, the organization will grant $10,000 in $300 scholarships to students.
Wendee Wolf-Schlarf, the Traverse City Area Public Schools K-12 music coordinator, noted that, in general, mini-grants to teachers are for materials not in the regular budget. Music Boosters will grant 13 of these $300 mini-grants this school year.
"Some items have been Orff instruments for our general music classrooms, CD recordings for listening lessons, solo literature books, recording/video equipment to use in the classroom, music stands and racks to hold the stands, guest clinicians that come in to work with our ensembles and hand-held percussion instruments that are used by elementary students," she noted.