The Studio Jazz Ensemble (the UW Big Band-Marc Seales, director) and Modern Ensemble (Stephanie Richards, director) present a shared program of repertory selections, original music, and inspired arrangements.
Program
Modern Band
Stephanie Richards – advisor
X – The Wheel: Jai Lasker
On the Trail: Ferde Grofe
Monk’s Dream: Thelonious Monk
C Jam Blues: Duke Ellington
Kiss: Rory Somers
Cole McKittrick, guitar; Jai Lasker, guitar; Riley Tobin, bass; Tobias Miller, drums; Coen Rios, tenor sax; Rory Somers, trumpet; Natalie Song, piano
Studio Jazz Ensemble
Marc Seales – advisor
The Days of Wine and Roses: Henry Mancini
arr. Clarke/Boland
Things Are Getting Better: Julian Adderley
arr. Rob McConnell
Latin Dance: Bob Mintzer
Slide’s Derangement: Slide Hampton
Trombones
Josiah Bizure, bass trombone
Eliana Koenig, trombone 2
Alex Weber, trombone 1 (lead)
Mack Henry, trombone 3
Trumpets
Timmy Brock, trumpet 5
Teddy Seligman, trumpet 4
Aidan Brannon, trumpet 3
Gavin Soleibe, trumpet 2
Benjamin Jess, trumpet 1 (lead)
Saxophones
Jason Lai, baritone sax
Joey Kyne, tenor sax
Kevin Eng, alto (lead)
Danica Raymundo, alto sax
Liam Salas, tenor sax
Rhythm Section
Gavin Westland, piano
Elise Soper, bass
Ruben Thomas, drums
Biographies
A noted pianist, composer and leading figure in the Northwest jazz scene, Marc Seales has shared stages with many of the great players of the last two decades. He has played with nearly every visiting jazz celebrity from Joe Henderson and Art Pepper to Benny Carter, Mark Murphy, and Bobby Hutcherson. With the late Don Lanphere he performed in such places as London, England; Kobe, Japan; The Hague in the Netherlands; and the North Sea Jazz Festival.
The musicians he admires most are Herbie Hancock, Charlie Parker, John Lewis, John Coltrane, Miles Davis, and Wynton Kelly, though he is quick to acknowledge that he owes the basically be-bop/post be-bop sound of his playing to his mentors, Don Lanphere and Floyd Standifer.
Critics have praised Seales variously for his "meaty piano solos," and "blues inflected, Hancock-inspired modernism." Winner of numerous Earshot awards (Instrumentalist of the Year in 1999 and Acoustic Jazz Group in 2000 and 2001; Jazz Hall of Fame, 2009), Seales is today promoting jazz awareness and molding young talents as a Professor of Music at the University of Washington, where he is a professor in the Jazz Studies Program. He teaches an array of courses, including History of Jazz, Jazz Piano, and Beginning and Advanced Improvisation, as well as leading various workshops and ensembles.
Stephanie "Steph" Richards is a dynamic improvisor known for her innovative approach to the trumpet and interdisciplinary expression as a composer. An “innately adventurous trumpeter,” (Downbeat), she has collaborated with visionaries Henry Threadgill, Anthony Braxton, Muhal Richard Abrams and John Zorn as well as art pop luminaries Yoko Ono, St. Vincent, David Byrne and Laurie Anderson. Characterized by The New York Times as “boldly inventive…Richards composes in ways that standard notation could never document,” her works span interactions with film, poetry, electronics, choreography and scent and have garnered critical acclaim including Record of the Year by the New York Times and Downbeat. Her seminal record Supersense (2019) featuring all-star improvisers Jason Moran, Stomu Takeishi and Kenny Wolleson includes multimedia artist Sean Raspet creating singular, abstract scents to both inform and converse with the recording.
Her work as an improviser has brought her into contact with progressive voices in jazz and experimental music, including Ravi Coltrane, Roscoe Mitchell, Mary Halvorson, Tomeka Reid, Nicole Mitchell, Ingrid Laubrock and Jeff Parker while her conducting work, informed by the concept of "Conduction" developed by Butch Morris, has taken her to orchestras around the world, where she continues to push the boundaries of musical expression.
As a founding member of Bang on a Can's Asphalt Orchestra and a collaborator with the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE), Anthony Braxton's Tricentric Orchestra, Henry Threadgill's Kestra, and the Kronos Quartet, Richards’ ensemble work has resulted in hundreds of premiered works by composers including Nico Muhly, Tyondai Braxton and John Luther Adams, interdisciplinary artists Mike Kelley, Laurie Anderson and Yoko Ono, and with choreographers Susan Marshall, Paul Taylor, David Dorfman and the Merce Cunningham company. Prior to her arrival at the UW in Fall 2024, where she serves as professor of music, she was a longtime faculty member at the University of San Diego, California. Richards is a Yamaha artist.