Jazz Performance Report 3pages

The music piece performed by the jazz band reflected various musicality and very interesting style of performance. Each individual band member was very aware of that they were performing along with others, therefore, intonation was really important. In the beginning, they started off as unison. They were together and the band sounded really confident. Once they began to divide up, they were aware of who or which instrument had the melody, so the musicians who were not playing the melody, such as the pianist, backed off with a decrescendo into the piece. This was very effective, because it brought out more emphasis on the musicians who played the melody, which were the saxophonist and the trumpet.

The style of the music was more like jazz than blues. The saxophonist played a few scale-like notes in a role, which made it jazz like. The style was also similar to jazz, because it had a lot of swings throughout the piece. Since the saxophonist had the melody for the majority of the time throughout the piece, he was the one who incorporated a lot of the swings in the music. The texture of the music was very smooth throughout. This was due to the accurate timing and the consistent tempos that remained the same throughout. Again, because the piece of music played did have a few blues scales within it, the texture of the piece was a little dreamy like. It created a very calming and relaxing sensations for the audience.

Each individual musician did a really good job on staying on top their own parts. The drummer in the back did a really good job at providing a stead beat for the rest of the band. It was really obvious that he was the one who kept the piece altogether. The pianist played a chromatic scale very smoothly and accurately throughout the piece. This added another layer of blues feeling or jazzy like feeling to the overall tone of the piece. The chords played by the pianist were mostly minors instead of major chords. This also added a very jazzy like and blue like feeling to the overall piece. The trumpet player was really good at following the dynamics of the piece. It was very impressive how the trumpet player was able to show a range of dynamics throughout the different parts of the performance. When at forte, the trumpet player really stood out from the rest of the musicians. This was really impressive because he was still able to maintain very solid notes without cracking any of the really high pitch notes. When the saxophone player was playing his solo, he did a really good job at staying with the rest of the band. Sometimes, it can be hard to stay on the right tempo when the musician is playing a solo. However, the saxophonist was very consistent with the tempo, though I could not tell if his solo was improvised or not. The saxophonist didn’t really look at his music sheet when he was playing the solo. The dynamics were very contrasting and made the music very interesting and fun.

The saxophonist was really skilled when he was playing the really fast part of piece of music. Though his fingers moved really fast along the keys of his sax, his fingers stayed really close to the keys. This benefitted him a lot because it was easier and faster for him to reach the keys with his fingers. Another very skilled technique observed was the preparation work the saxophonist had done each time before he was about to play his part of the melody. Each time before he starting playing his part, he always relax his lips by blowing air out. Then, he would wet his reed by putting the mouthpiece into his mouth for a few seconds. This helped him to make sure that he would be able to get a quick response from the saxophone when he starts blowing air in it. Another thing observed was that the saxophonist never really took a breath during each phrase of the piece. He only took breaths in between the phrases. This was not as obvious, because he took he breaths really fast. However, by doing this, it really helped to make the piece connect and flow a lot better. This made the entire piece of music to sound smoother rather than to sound disconnected.

One other thing which I noticed that was really important was the way which the cello player was behaving when he was playing his part. Throughout the entire performance, I noticed that the base player was consistently tapping his right hand softly onto his base. I assumed that he was the only one who could hear himself tapping. This was a really useful technique to help him to make sure that he was staying with the right tempo. Especially since he is the base, he should be conscious of the tempo than anyone else in the band. The consistency which he used this tapping technique to make sure that he was in the right consistency of the tempo was really professional.

Overall, the observation made were very fun and I really learned a lot in how musicals are able to interact with each other during a concert performance. Their body movements and their gestures with their instruments are all different ways of communicating among themselves. The musicians were able to maintain a steady tempo with each other. They were able to show the contrast in the dynamics within the different parts of the music. The melody always stood out from the rest of the parts. This made the piece of music really engaging for the audiences. The style of the music was demonstrated through the melodies and chords. The musicians really delivered a very unique and engaging concert.