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thewichitan.com — your campus / your news
Wednesday — December 5, 2012
B all that jazz B Orlando Flores Jr. A&E Editor
The MSU Jazz Ensemble performed their annual fall concert on Thursday, Nov. 29 in Akin Auditorium.
Associate music professor Alan Black directed the ensemble through their hour-long set. While no student compositions were played, the ensemble performed pieces from big band leg-
ends like Count Basie and Duke Ellington, as well as modern jazz pieces. “There’s still a lot of jazz being written today,” Black said. “One of the guys that we play a lot of
Junior Andrew Checki and sophomore Wes Killion performed their trumpet solos during the fall concert in Akin Auditorium.
their material is Gordon Goodwin, who’s one of the biggest big band leaders playing today out of Los Angeles.” The ensemble played Goodwin’s “Get in Line” and “Count
Bubba,” as well as Texas native Kris Berg’s “Rule the Roost” as their modern pieces. Black said that he and the ensemble were very pleased with the attendance for the concert.
“The turnout was very good,” Black said. “And we were very pleased with the audience. The band is young this semester, but they did an excellent job.”
Sophomore Trevor Cornwell plays the baritone saxophone player for the Jazz Ensemble. According to Black, there are no “chairs” in the ensemble like there are in other music groups, but each person has their own part to play. “The students all worked really hard to get their parts ready for the concert,” Black said.
Photo by KERRI CARTER
Photo by KERRI CARTER
Senior Max Salazar plays “The Residual Fire Dance.” This is Salazar’s second semester playing with the Jazz Ensemble. Photo by KERRI CARTER
DIWALI from pg. 1 “The money we made went toward the food,” Nayak said. “We bought it from an Indian restaurant in Dallas and picked it up today.”
Nayak explained food for each MISA event is ordered from this restaurant. “For every event, we try to make changes in the food so we
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don’t serve the same food every time,” Nayak said. For the Diwali show, MISA and participating students performed several traditional Indian dances, including a garba and dandiya dance with sticks, Bollywood and regional folk dances, and even some country two-stepping and swing. “Frankly speaking, all of the performances were done in just two days,” said Hrishi Pathak,
MISA treasurer. Nayak admitted some dances were even practiced for just a few hours. “It’s in our blood,” he said. “We dance to any music, any tune, any time.” For the various dances, students wore colorful, traditional Indian attire that were decorated with sequins, beads and jewelry. The clothes were already owned by the students in MISA.
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“We [Indian students] usually have them,” Nayak said. “All Indians have a set of cultural attire, and this is the attire that we usually wear.” Nick Rainey, a junior health sciences major, came to the Diwali event after he was invited by one of the dancers. He said that he liked the show. “I thought it was very entertaining and something that a lot more people should come out to see,” he said. Sophomore Jaymina Patel, who is from Guharat, India, said she came out to support all of the Indian students and MISA. She said she also enjoyed the performances, especially Pathak’s energetic dance with another male MISA student that featuring Pathak doing the iconic moonwalk. “I think the guy’s dance was very good,” Patel said. “They took the whole show.” Michael Shipley, faculty advisor and biology professor, also said the students were excellent. Following the show, MISA members like Nayak and Pathak were happy with Diwali’s success in turnout and performance, especially considering the time they used to organize and publicize
the show. “Yes, we are really happy about the turnout of so many people in just one week,” Pathak said. For the first time, this group of students was made up of not only Indian students, but Caribbean and American students as well. Pathak said having students from other cultures participate in the Diwali show was the highlight of the evening. “My favorite part of being in the event was actually being a part of an event which is now multicultural,” Pathak said. “Initially, when we started this organization it was just Indian students. Now we have students from all over campus.” Nayak agreed with Pathak, citing making the event multicultural as her most enjoyable part of this experience. “Initially, when we had such an event it was just the Indian students who would participate,” Nayak said. “But this time we had the Caribbean students who deliberately took part. We had the American students, and so for me, it’s that the event is multicultural.”