Musical Journeys: 2012 Battle of the Bands

Jimmy Maks was the site of the Jazz Society of Oregon's 2012 Battle of the Bands; 4 high school combos representing Battle Ground, Lincoln and West Linn High Schools. West Linn won the inaugural competition last year and brought a strong team back to defend. Lincoln brought 2 teams, Glen and his Men and the JJ Nils Sextet.
Battle Ground competed for the first time and is taking the hardware north of the Columbia with a narrow win for the Jeff Cumpston Trophy.

Each band performed 3 tunes; one tune of their choosing, one that was given to them 2 weeks prior to the competition - all bands performed that same tune, "I Could Write a Book". The third tune was a randomly drawn set of charts given each band that evening. Each band had to perform a tune that they had not seen prior to the evening of the competition. As Art Abrams said, "this is what jazz is all about, you get a gig and often do not see the music until you arrive at the club....". Art was joined on the judging panel with Mike Horsfall and Devin Phillips. Yeah!

From my perspective as a non musician, my attention was drawn to two things:
First, I realize (again!) how much I enjoy watching young people perform with such skill and enthusiasm. These students are good musicians having fun performing in one of the nation's top jazz venues. Second, I was intrigued by the feedback given the musicians by our judges. The criticisms were direct but always in a positive light.

The scoring was very close; each band gave interesting interpretations on the sight reading pieces; one incorporated vocals into their performance; I loved it! See you next year.

Next up; Mike Horsfall this Friday at Touche's and the Karla Harris Farewell party at Wilf's on March 14th.