By MATT PIKE
The Northwest Missouri State University jazz ensemble will pay tribute to the founder of the University’s original jazz ensemble as it returns to the stage in October.
On Monday October 5th the concert will be free and open to the public, beginning at 7pm at the Charles Johnson Theater in the Olive DeLuce Fine Arts Building on the campus of Northwest Missouri State University. The program will include Duke Ellington’s “C-Jam Blues,” “A Minor Interruption,” “Moanin’,” “L’il Darlin’,” “Lulu’s Back in Town,” “Sunset Glow” and “The Last Dive,” among others.
Professor of Music William Richardson conducts the ensembles, which will perform a program dedicated to Earle Moss, a music faculty member at Northwest from 1954 to 1986. At Northwest, Moss served as director of bands and a teacher of music theory, in addition to directing the Progressive Jazz Group. He also led the founding of the Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia music fraternity. Moss, who continued to reside in Maryville after his retirement, died at the age of 80 in 2002.
“This particular concert is special because we are celebrating the legacy of Earle Moss, longtime Northwest music faculty member and founder of the Northwest Progressive Jazz Group in 1955,” Richardson says in a news release from the University. “One of the pieces we are performing is an original composition of Earle’s, ‘Sax Happy,’ and we are replicating the signature concert opening that the Progressive Jazz Group used for many years.”
The Jazz Ensemble is an audition-based group of musicians dedicated to performing a variety of jazz and commercial music. The ensemble annually sponsors the Northwest District Jazz Band performance and the Northwest Jazz Festival. It also hosts numerous guest artists. To learn more about Northwest’s musical ensembles and upcoming performances, visit www.nwmissouri.edu/finearts/music/.
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