For the better part of two decades, Augustana University and the Sioux Falls Jazz & Blues Society (SFJB) have been working in concert with one another, whether it be through the non-profit organization’s All-City Jazz Ensembles or Jazz Camp.
“Jazz was born in America; it's America's music, which a lot of people don't realize,” said SFJB Executive Director Alex Gilbert-Schrag.
“Jazz music is alive and well here. It's still being created, and still being created here,” added Augustana’s Director of Jazz Studies and Assistant Professor of Music Dr. Brian Hanegan.
This past spring, the two partnered again, this time for SFJB’s Jazz Diversity Project (JDP).
Since 2006, a quintet from SFJB has been bringing live jazz music into schools throughout South Dakota. Since the program’s inception, the group has toured more than 50 schools, reaching more than 65,000 students in the state.
“The quintet presents a multimedia presentation to middle schools, sometimes high schools, around our state. It’s all based on the middle school curriculum of history and social studies, which is then meshed into the timeline of jazz music and what was going on in the jazz world,” Gilbert-Schrag said.
But in 2020, the program came to a screeching halt due to COVID-19. Instead, a pandemic was rocking the world.
Gilbert-Schrag said, “One thing that Jim Spears (the executive director of Art South Dakota) and some of the guys (in the quintet) had hoped for was to have more material to provide the students, besides just coming in, being with them one day and then leaving. Sometimes, they don't go back and visit those schools for four years because they wait until the turnover has happened and there’s a new group of students. And, with the pandemic, we're not doing our regular programming, so we decided to create some videos that would accompany the program as part of our outreach.”
That’s where Augustana’s School of Music (SoM) comes in.
About 20 SoM students in the Northlanders Jazz Band and Augustana Jazz Combo contributed to the project, as well as several Augustana faculty. Of course, there is music, but also roundtable discussions with Hanegan, Jazz Bass Instructor Andrew Reinartz ‘05 and Jeremy Hegg ‘94 of the Hegg Brothers.
“Jazz started out in New Orleans and had to almost navigate the racial tensions, because those were some of the first times that you had black and white musicians on stage performing together. When they were on tour, they couldn't stay anywhere near each other. Those were some of the issues that really shaped the music into what it became,” said Gilbert-Schrag. “So, I think, to understand jazz, you have to understand what was going on, historically and racially, at that time.”
The SoM is not only helping SDJB with the content, but the content was recorded in Hamre Hall on Augustana’s campus and will be produced by the Dean of the School of Music Dr. Peter Folliard from the university's world-class recording studio, Studio 47.
“This is a massive project. Obviously, I rely upon the knowledge of all of my colleagues, contemporaries, even the students, to put this package together so that we tell the story as accurately as we can with the resources we have and unique to our experiences at Augustana, unique to our experiences in Sioux Falls, and also, South Dakota,” said Hanegan.
Because Hanegan knows from experience how valuable these experiences can be.
“There's a remarkable connection (to SFJB),” Hanegan said, smiling.
The Sioux Falls native, who has a Doctor of Musical Arts in Saxophone Performance, says he wasn’t good enough to make the middle school jazz band so he didn’t start playing jazz until he was in high school. After lots of practice, he made the All-City Jazz Ensemble, sponsored by none other than SFJB.
“I feel like, if you can bring this music to students at a younger age, hopefully, you spark an interest, because a lot of times, students don't know what they’ve not heard or what they've not learned. Most of the time, kids in the K-12 community are not listening to this music right now. So, we're just kind of showing people, ‘Hey, check out this music. It's unique to America, it's still here and it's in your Justin Bieber hits, it's in your Taylor Swift songs, it's your rock music,’” said Hanegan. “The inner workings (of jazz) can all be traced back. We're just showing a modern or new audience this old music.”
Jazz may not have touched Hanegan until his teenage years, but once it did, it hasn’t let go.
“It’s the challenge,” said Hanegan, about what draws him to the genre. “Jazz music is so remarkably difficult, and yet, when you hear people play it, just seems so easy. It just seems so fluid, effortless. It's the challenge of improvisation; I just can't get enough of it. The search for something that doesn't exist, like this end game. If I can get to this point, I've made it, or something doesn't exist in music, so you're constantly hungry to keep improving.”
By creating this type of content, SFJB hopes they can touch many more young Hanegans out there.
“I think the partnership was a no-brainer because it's all based on education and getting kids experiences with music,” said Gilbert-Schrag. “We can be that funnel to help guide kids, that if they really want to pursue music, we have an in with Augustana and can help them figure out whether or not that's something they really want to do, or at least, explore that option.”
With help from Augustana and its SoM, the SFJB is creating three videos entitled “Origins of Jazz,” “The Big Band Era,” as well as “Bebop and Beyond.” They are exclusively available to students who have the opportunity to experience the JDP this fall.
For more information on Augustana’s School of Music, visit augie.edu/music.
For more information on the Sioux Falls Jazz & Blues Society, visit sfjb.org.
