Jazz Column susie Jones Jazz Chair

All-state Auditions

We have completed another round of auditions for the All-State honor ensembles. Now is an appropriate time to reflect on the results. Let’s start with the good news. There were a few really outstanding audition tapes/CDs submitted. Here is the bad news. The total quantity of tapes/CDs received was dismal at best. Here is the breakdown:

Let’s remove as many barriers as possible, and let’s start with the audition material itself. A revamping of the jazz audition is long overdue, so let’s have new jazz audition material in place for next year. Directors, please submit your ideas on what you would like to see for the jazz audition material. You can send your ideas to me at the address listed below.

Are there other barriers? Do your students think “I don’t have a chance of making it into the All-State jazz groups so why bother to try?” Assuming that this might be a factor, please make your students aware of the historically low number of audition tapes/ CDs that are received each year. This is not the first year that we have received a low number of submissions, but hopefully it will be the last.

If you have suggestions for the improvement of the All-State jazz audition, please contact me in one of the following ways:

Is it lack of interest in jazz? I think not, especially when you consider the number of students who participated in the week-long Mel Brown Summer Jazz Camp this year. 145! Wow!

There must be some other barrier(s) preventing students from submitting audition tapes.

Susie Jones joness@mhcc.edu

503.491.7158

Music Dept.

Mt. Hood Community College

26000 SE Stark St. Gresham, OR 97030