University of North Texas One O’Clock Lab Band

When

Saturday 23rd October at 20:00
In concert on a stunning double bill with the CIT-CORK SCHOOL OF MUSIC JAZZ BIG BAND – Director John O’Connor

Where

CIT - Cork School of Music

Price: €10
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+ One O’Clock Lab Band's website
+ One O’Clock Lab Band's Myspace page

About

The Cork Jazz Festival warmly welcomes this award winning big band from the USA, widely reckoned to be the best college jazz big band in the world today.

The One O’Clock Lab Band is the premier performing ensemble of the internationally acclaimed University of North Texas College of Music’s jazz studies programme. This famous comprehensive music school has the largest enrolment of any music institution accredited by the National Association of Schools of Music in the USA, and is the oldest (and first) in the world offering a degree in jazz studies.

With an unprecedented six Grammy nominations resulting from the library of over fifty critically acclaimed Lab Band recordings to date, the One O’Clock Lab Band is noted for exceptional individual musicianship and tight ensemble performance.

The band’s concerts feature material from the Stan Kenton and Maynard Ferguson libraries (both housed exclusively at North Texas), original compositions by Grammy-nominated composers Neil Slater and Steve Wiest, and compositions and arrangements written by current and former North Texas students.

Steve Wiest, an alumnus (Master of Music/Jazz Studies – 1988) of the UNT College of Music, has been the musical director of the One O\'Clock Lab Band since the latter part of 2008. Wiest earned a Grammy nomination in 2007 for \"Best Arrangement on an Instrumental while a member (trombonist, composer, arranger) of the Maynard Ferguson Big Band on Maynard’s final CD.

The Lab Band has toured internationally with great success over the decades, performing in Russia, Mexico, England, Australia, Portugal, Finland, Norway, France, Switzerland, The Netherlands, Canada, Germany, Italy, Japan, Hong Kong, Poland and Thailand. Most recently the band toured major jazz festivals in Europe including Montreux, Vienne, North Sea, and Umbria. The band has also performed by Presidential invitation at the White House.

Placement in the University is by audition, \"The One O\'Clock\" being the most competitive. Norah Jones, for example, who while a student, never held a chair in the One O\'Clock band, but studied jazz piano and worked part time in the Jazz Studies office.

Don’t miss this superb big band – one of the best ensembles to perform in Cork in recent years.