The first Jazz Ensemble concert of the spring semester will feature Music department faculty member Bruce Jordan.
Jordan said he loves performance and having the opportunity to direct the jazz ensemble at Sinclair Community College.
Apart from being a director, Jordan said he is a true performer.
“Performers live for the audience and for the audience response,” he said. “If you go through the entire concert, for instance, and you get a standing ovation at the end of it, there’s just nothing like it — it makes all the hard work worth it.”
Jordan will be playing the saxophone during the concert.
“I’m big on performance so any chance I get to perform, I take it,” he said. “We generally have five saxophones in the saxophone section, and for this concert one of them gets off the hook and I play the main saxophone parts.”
During the concert, nine different pieces will be performed, including one from Maynard Ferguson, who is known for the theme song in the movie “Rocky.”
“This concert takes me about a year to put together because I have to choose different pieces and contrasting styles,” he said. “There are different varieties, different tempos and different levels of excitement.”
The Jazz Ensemble features both community members and students on campus.
“The community members skill levels are high because they have generally been playing a long time,” Jordan said. “So the students who make this group skill levels are also very high, it’s really incredible.”
Jordan said because of the diversity of members, it often can create a better product on stage.
“A big motivator for students is that they are sitting next to an experienced person,” he said. “If they can train next to an experienced person, the level of awesome increases, it’s a really good motivator.”
The concert will be Friday, Jan. 24 at 8 p.m. in Blair Hall Theatre and will only last about an hour and a half.
“It’s a free concert and if you haven’t seen this group, give it a try,” he said. “I think you’ll find a lot of levels of excitement, joy and soul in this performance.”
Jordan is a graduate of Indiana University with a master’s degree in Music Performance and has previously played in Germany at the Fachakademie fur Musik, Nurberg.
“I’m incredibly proud of the ensemble,” he said. “For somebody like me, who is a performer, to have such an outstanding performing group is just great.”
For more information about the Jazz Ensemble concert, contact Jordan at Bruce.Jordan@sinclair.edu or call (937) 512-4400.