Sisters jazz bands finish top at Reno Jazz Fest

Four bands from Sisters High School and Sisters Middle School participated in the 47th annual Reno Jazz Festival held April 23-25 at the campus of the University of Nevada.

The festival featured performances by more than 325 groups. During the concluding showcase and awards concert of the festival, attended by an audience of over four thousand, each Sisters group was recognized as a standout band.

Over the main two days of the event, 45 highly qualified educators from around the country serve on adjudication panels that listen constructively and provide voice-over recorded comments to each performing group. Students and their directors also work with adjudicators in a post-performance session, offering on-the-spot reinforcement and ideas in working toward improvement.

The adjudication panels also award points to each group using a scoring guide which evaluates specific areas of musical performance: Quality and quantity of improvisation, playing in tempo, playing in tune, articulation, dynamics, balance and blend, style and interpretation, programming and presentation. This system encourages an objective an informative earning of points.

Sisters Middle School presented a large jazz ensemble for the first time this school year, with 24 student members. Over the past seven years, SMS has included successful small jazz ensembles, defined as combos, with a smaller membership of up to seven students. The larger SMS Jazz Band has been well received in several performances this year, including the recent Reno event, where they performed as part of a single middle school category including 32 bands from Los Angles to Seattle.

This open middle school division offers recognition to the top 10 bands, most often earned by schools from large cities. This year the top 10 list included Sisters, which enthusiastically accepted 10th-place recognition.

This is a particularly notable achievement, as the SMS Jazz Band meets as a once-a-week after-school club, in comparison to a once-a-day class format represented by the majority of middle schools performing in the Reno Jazz Festival.

Sisters High School had three groups performing in Reno: Two small ensembles performing in combo divisions, and a large ensemble performing in a band division.

The core of the high school program is represented by the 15-member Sisters High Jazz Band. In Reno, this group participated in a large jazz ensemble division representing 17 schools with enrollment up to 950, where they gave a standout performance, earning second place. SHS Combo Two received fifth place in the 1A combo division which included 20 bands from schools with less than 850 students.

SHS Combo One participated in Reno by "playing up," asking for the opportunity to perform three categories above their enrollment status in the 4A division. This division included 20 bands from performing arts high schools and large city public schools with enrollment well beyond two thousand. Sisters High Combo One was awarded second place in this division, runner-up to Las Vegas Academy for the Performing Arts.

When not performing in Reno, the Sisters students checked out over a dozen other band programs, including several from reputable university jazz studies programs such as UCLA, CSU Northridge, CSU East Bay and the University of Oregon.

The Sisters Jazz program attends the Reno Jazz Festival through program fundraising and member pay-to-participate fees. Having performed in the top of their respective divisions for nine consecutive years at the Reno festival, Sisters students are also gaining interest in auditioning for participation in performance opportunities affiliated with organizations such as the Monterey Jazz Festival, Down Beat Magazine, Berklee College of Music, and other national jazz education programs. For more information about the Sisters School Jazz Bands call 549-4045 ext.1025.