Love Great American Music? Have We Got Some Courses for You!
MUS F22-02: An American Songbook
Oct 24 and 25, 3:15-5:15
Are you a fan of wonderful American songs performed by exceptional talents? Then you will want to check out this course.
Baritone Rick Beaubien and pianist Natasha Stojanovska discuss and perform a glorious selection of 20th Century American art songs and opera arias. These compositions–by such masters as Charles Ives and Stephen Sondheim–often feature the words of our country’s most renowned poets, such as Walt Whitman, Edwin Arlington Robinson, and Langston Hughes. The course will appeal to music-lovers and poetry-lovers alike.
MUS F22-04 California “Cool”: The People, Sights, and Sounds that Defined West Coast Jazz
Sep 22, 29, Oct 6, 12, 3:15-5:15
Another side of American music is jazz, called “America’s only true art form.” In the late 1940s, jazz performers created a new “Cool” jazz sound centered in California clubs.
Pioneered by sophisticated jazz musicians in the 1940s, California “Cool” jazz traces its origins to a Miles Davis rehearsal band–the Miles Davis Nonet–and jazz jam sessions in Hermosa Beach’s Lighthouse Club. Saxophonist Stan Getz and guitarist Charlie Byrd redefined the sound of West Coast jazz in the 1950s and 1960s by introducing Brazilian rhythms and Bossa Nova, including such recordings as “Girl from Ipanema.”
Come join us to learn more about the development of this distinctly American music.
Instructor Bruce Johnson’s introduction to jazz occurred at age 8 when his father handed him a saxophone. He studied orchestral jazz composition and arranging during high school summers spent honing his performance skills and exploring the southern California jazz scene.
