No one can remember exactly when, or why, jazz began to die in the Chicago Public Schools, but a couple of years ago some intrepid music teachers decided to do something about it.
Knowing that Chicago’s schools once had produced some of the world’s greatest jazz artists — from sublime singer-pianist Nat “King” Cole to ultraromantic balladeer Johnny Hartman — the teachers weren’t going to let the music quietly fade away. Just because rap and hip-hop were playing on the radio didn’t mean that jazz should wither in Chicago schools that once had launched tenor saxophone greats Von Freeman and Johnny Griffin, piano virtuoso Dorothy Donegan, church-tinged belter Dinah Washington, crooner Joe Williams and scores more.
So over the weekend the teachers revived a once glorious annual event on Chicago’s musical calendar — the All-City High School Jazz Band Competition. More than two years in the planning, the rejuvenated contest brought robust swing rhythms, plaintive blues melodies and some phenomenal feats of ensemble playing to the auditorium of Curie Metropolitan High School, 4959 S. Archer Ave.
More important, Saturday’s four-hour-plus jazz marathon proved that a public school system once envied across the country for the depth of its young musical talent still is capable of nurturing emerging musicians of the highest order.
“As all of you can see, [I’m] an old man who can’t play a note,” octogenarian Chicago historian Timuel Black told the kids from a podium onstage, just before the musicmaking began.
“But I remember hearing my friends at Wendell Phillips and DuSable High Schools — people like Nat Cole,” continued Black, pointing to music programs directed by the legendary music instructor Capt. Walter Dyett.
“What everyone learned from Capt. Dyett was that to make great music you need discipline and cooperation and teamwork.”
But once the young musicians began filing onto the stage — each smartly dressed in school uniforms and holding their instruments close to them, with care — it was obvious that traditions Capt. Dyett established from the 1930s to the ’60s still glimmer in today’s smaller jazz programs.
With each band’s set, in fact, the teenage musicians affirmed that they had been doing their homework.
The steeped-in-blues sensibility that the Lane Tech College Preparatory band brought to “Night Train,” the buoyant dance beats that the Simeon Career Academy unit found in “Fiesta Latina” and the remarkable control of phrasing that the William Jones College Preparatory ensemble showed in “Lil’ Darlin'” demonstrated that jazz still swings in Chicago’s high schools. Similarly, the band from Lincoln Park High School brought considerable technical acumen to Duke Ellington’s ferociously difficult “Rockin’ in Rhythm,” while the kids from Curie Metropolitan High School dispatched “Nice-N-Easy Blues” with an aptly breezy tone and style.
After each band performed, one of the four judges stepped onto the stage to offer a brief clinic on how an already strong performance might be improved (the judges were trumpeter Burgess Gardner, reedist Ernest Dawkins, bandleader-educator Andrew Hoefle and educator Curtis L. Prince).
After each band performed, one of the four judges stepped onto the stage to offer a brief clinic on how an already strong performance might be improved (the judges were trumpeter Burgess Gardner, reedist Ernest Dawkins, bandleader-educator Andrew Hoefle and educator Curtis L. Prince).
But nothing prepared listeners for the performance by the band from Kenwood Academy, 5015 S. Blackstone Ave.
Here was a formidable ensemble that played with the technical assurance, stylistic mastery and tonal radiance of an ace college band.
Before the Kenwood kids had reached the end of their first number, a muscular arrangement of “Satin Doll,” many listeners — including the kids from competing ensembles — began cheering.
And after the Kenwood band had ignited Dizzy Gillespie’s rhythmically tricky “Manteca” and Don Menza’s soulful “Groovin’ Hard,” more than a few listeners dabbed at their eyes, for it was impossible to be unmoved by the sight and sound of these kids playing so masterfully. The achievement said a great deal about the potential of youngsters given a chance to excel.
When it came time for adjudicator Prince to coach the Kenwood ensemble, he shrugged his shoulders, looked at the audience and said, “Hey, what can I say? It’s a great band.”
More than a performance
To Kenwood band director William McClellan, this day was about much more than just a tour de force performance.
“Did you notice that when any of the bands were playing, there were no cat-calls or fights or booing or anything like that?” said McClellan, after the afternoon’s performances.
“Did you notice how close attention every band paid to every other band?
“There’s this whole myth of the Chicago Public Schools child being this person who no one can get along with — a troublemaker — but that’s not true. Anyone who was here today can see what kids are capable of.”
The credit, said the students, goes to McClellan.
“Mr. McClellan, he’s a very serious guy,” said Kenwood trombonist Sidney Tolbert, 17, a Kenwood junior who plans to study music at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb before moving on to the new jazz program at the Juilliard Conservatory in New York.
“But he’s also always singing and dancing when we’re rehearsing. He’s always telling us that if you haven’t got your groove on when you’re playing, it’s going to sound dead, because then the audience won’t get their groove on.
“Every time we get a big head,” added Sidney, “Mr. McClellan will tell us to listen to some CDs by [trumpeter] Dizzy Gillespie or [trombonist] J.J. Johnson, and that will cure your big head, because those guys know how to play.”
Even the schools that couldn’t approach the virtuosity of Kenwood turned in credible, polished performances that involved months of hard work. The event was as much a tribute to the youngsters as it was to their teachers, all of whom had toiled to prove that jazz traditions long identified with Chicago’s high schools are worth preserving and expanding.
Looking for answers
“I’m a product of the Chicago Public Schools, and I don’t know why jazz music kind of disappeared from the schools for a while,” said Larry Polk, the band director at Simeon Academy who helped organize the competition with the not-for-profit Jazz Institute of Chicago.
“Just knowing this competition was happening had a great effect. When I started up the jazz band at Simeon a couple of years ago, we had four kids sign up. Now we’ve got 20, and it’s growing.”
Polk’s passion for the music — as well as the efforts of McClellan and his colleagues — made Saturday’s event possible and may have revived the competition as an annual event.
“I’m almost positive that we’re going to see this competition get bigger every year after what happened this time,” said Diane Chandler, director of the bureau of cultural arts in the Chicago Public Schools.
When it came time to announce the results of the contest, the judges did not rank the bands first, second, third and so forth.
“That might be destructive to a program, because if a band comes out seventh out of seven, some of the kids might get discouraged about even trying again,” McClellan explained.
Instead, the bands were placed in one of four categories: superior, excellent, good and fair, with Kenwood, Curie and Jones ranked superior, the rest excellent. A more specific score sheet was given privately to each band director.
“I don’t know what Capt. Dyett would have said about our kids, because he was not easy to impress,” said McClellan, who as a high school student witnessed Capt. Dyett in action.
“The important thing, though, is that we’re now trying pick up again where Capt. Dyett left off.
“After today, I think we may be on our way.”
