First-Ever Joint Faculty Concert Anchors Jazz Orchestra Weekend

Nine musicians and teachers from Wesleyan University’s Music Department will perform together in various combinations for the first time as the featured artists of the 23rd annual Wesleyan Jazz Orchestra Weekend on Saturday April 25 in Crowell Concert Hall.

The event will coincide with the culmination of Jazz Appreciation Month, which was created by the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History in 2001 to recognize and celebrate the genre’s heritage and history. “Everybody [in the concert] is a jazz musician, and focuses on teaching that aspect of African American-derived music at Wesleyan,” said vibraphonist and Professor of Music and African American Studies Jay Hoggard ’76, MA ’91. “Everyone is very aware of the cultural, historic origins and trajectory of the music.”

Featured performers for the Wesleyan Jazz Faculty Concert will include Noah Baerman on piano, Eric Charry on guitar, Alcee Chriss on piano and organ, Giacomo Gates on vocals, Darius Jones on alto saxophone, and Roy Wiseman on bass. Two of the artists—drummer Pheeroan akLaff and guitarist Tony Lombardozzi—are retiring from teaching private lessons this academic year after several decades at Wesleyan.

Saxophonist Bill Barron (1927–1989) served as chair of the Music Department, and started the Wesleyan Jazz Orchestra, which has been directed by Hoggard since 1991. Barron recruited Lombardozzi, a New Haven native who previously taught at Housatonic Community College in Bridgeport, to start teaching at Wesleyan in 1986. "I hope that I took the traditional approach—the way that we learned music 50 years ago or more—and left it open to do completely experimental things within that context and outside of that context,” Lombardozzi said. “And that helped me to have students really find themselves. Wesleyan students are already inclined to do that—to not be the status quo.”

“I had a lot of students that didn't play jazz that were very successful,” Lombardozzi said. “Most of them were not music majors. Some were great guitar players. A lot of students have amazing success at all different levels.” His students have included ethnomusicologist Harris Berger ‘88, Games of Thrones creator D.B. Weiss ‘93, jazz guitarist Mary Halvorson ‘02, Andrew VanWyngarden '05 of the rock band MGMT, and Justin Friedman ‘16 of D'Angelico Guitars.

Lombardozzi said he would use tunes that his students enjoyed to demonstrate what he wanted to teach them, from harmony to how the song was put together, and then explore different approaches to manipulate or twist those fixed sounds. “They would turn me on to a lot of really good music,” Lombardozzi said. “The students would come back with fantastic ideas or songs.” As his students got better, he would have them look at jazz tunes by Miles Davis, Thelonious Monk, Charles Mingus, or John Scofield. Lombardozzi said he was planning to do a tune by Monk at the concert, along with a classic Brazilian jazz song.

Lombardozzi revealed that both he and Charry studied guitar with Barry Galbraith, who recorded with many jazz artists including Davis, Billie Holiday, and Gil Evans. "It's like studying with Picasso if you were a painter," Lombardozzi said of studying with Galbraith.

akLaff started teaching at Wesleyan in 1993, but first performed in Crowell Concert Hall in 1975 at the age of 20 on the recommendation of Hoggard, who was a student at the University at the time and had started playing in the band Déjà Vu with akLaff in New Haven. akLaff subbed for drummer Ed Blackwell in Barron’s group, which included pianist Barry Harris. "That one concert was a very special moment in my development and history,” akLaff said. “I always consider [Barron] my first teacher to some degree once I moved east [from Michigan].”

akLaff came from The New School in New York to teach at Wesleyan after Blackwell retired. “I would like to think that I came with a perspective that would further the students in ways that their general academics would not,” akLaff said. As a world traveler—including work starting in the 1980s with Japanese pianist Yōsuke Yamashita’s trio with bassist Cecil McBee, and a 2003 tour to New Zealand with saxophonist Oliver Lake and trumpeter Baikida Carroll—akLaff said he could distill that information in exchanges with his students, which have included drummers Guillermo E. Brown ’98, Tim Keiper '02, and Jake Nussbaum '10.

Each faculty member will have a ten-minute segment during the concert to feature their individual choice of music with any combination of their colleagues that they wish, ranging from a guitar duo between Lombardozzi and Charry, to larger ensembles led by akLaff and Jones.

“I think it will be an interesting creative interaction,” Hoggard said “Everyone's going to try to bring some really powerful, uplifting music. It’s a little glimpse of what they do—an opportunity to try something different. I’m sure there will be a few surprises.”

The concert will open with a 45-minute set performed by members of the Wesleyan Jazz Orchestra, directed by Hoggard. The Wesleyan student jazz ensembles will also perform their own concert on Friday, April 24.