WSMA State Honors Concerts

- And now, it is my distinct privilege to introduce the 2025 WSMA High School State Honors Jazz Ensemble and their distinguished conductor, Michael Dease.

[applause] - Michael Dease: Hey, good morning, y'all.

How is everybody doing today?

All right, whoo!

Give it up again for Carrie.

She's been doing a great job.

How 'bout it?

[applause] Well, it has been a real joy both in June and now here, on Halloween, to work with these amazing students, and I really, I mean, they are fantastic.

We've had a fun time rehearsing.

We rehearsed 10 hours yesterday, and the music that we chose to play for you is iconic.

It's important, landmark music in the jazz world from a variety of different composers and different styles, all across approximately 100-year span of jazz.

So we hope you enjoy it.

Everybody in the band gets a little solo feature in a break to get a chance to send their music out to you so you can hear their personality and their spirit.

And y'all have such wonderful things happening in here, in the state of Wisconsin, because of all the dedication that you have as family and teachers and friends and supporters, thank you so very much for what you've done for these students up here.

I feel a little guilty 'cause I have the best seat in the house.

I'm the closest to these cats as they play.

And then, y'all got the next best seat.

I don't even have to play.

As a matter of fact, I have this toy from Yamaha that, it's like a loudspeaker.

It says, "Make yourself heard."

So, I'd like to thank Yamaha for their generous support.

[audience laughs] But seriously, I'm a Yamaha artist for almost 10 years now, and they make the best instruments.

I play all the instruments, and they're based in California, so they can probably hear me when I use this.

Thank you, Yamaha!

[audience laughs] Thank you.

We're gonna start our concert.

I only have several more pages of comments.

[audience laughs] But, no, seriously, suffice it to say, it's gonna be a really fun 35 minutes.

Buckle up, enjoy.

Please clap and support these students as they play their butts off for you, okay?

Sound like a deal?

[audience applauds] We'll get the show started.

["A Night in Tunisia" by John "Dizzy" Gillespie] [jaunty jazz music] [bluesy guitar solo] ["A Night in Tunisia" by John "Dizzy" Gillespie] [trumpet solo] [trombone solo] [saxophone solo] ["A Night in Tunisia" by John "Dizzy" Gillespie] [audience applauds and cheers] Whoa, whoa, whoo!

How 'bout that band?

This is gonna be a good day, so.

That was Michael Mossman's arrangement of the great Dizzy Gillespie composition "A Night in Tunisia."

Michael Mossman was trumpet player with Michel Camilo, Horace Silver.

He even played with Art Blakey at some point, and he's been the composer in residence of the WDR Big Band in Cologne, Germany.

One of the best writers you could ever hope to write your charts.

So we're gonna continue with one of his major influences, the great Thad Jones.

Thad Jones was in the Count Basie band.

He's one of the famous Jones brothers from Michigan.

Go Michigan State.

[all chuckle] Whoo, almost messed that up for a second.

This is his beautiful composition that he wrote for his jazz orchestra, which is now called the Village Vanguard Jazz Orchestra.

And this is called "Kids Are Pretty People."

["Kids Are Pretty People" by Thad Jones] [groovy jazz music] [trumpet solo] ["Kids Are Pretty People" by Thad Jones] [trombone solo] ["Kids Are Pretty People" by Thad Jones] ["Kids Are Pretty People" by Thad Jones] [piano solo] [audience applauds] [upright bass solo] [audience applauds and cheers] "Kids Are Pretty People" by Thad Jones.

And you heard, on that particular version, you heard Ari on trumpet.

Yeah, Ari.

[audience applauds and cheers] You heard Cody on trombone.

[audience applauds and cheers] Cody.

Who else?

You heard a little bit of Lily on piano, you heard Noah on the bass.

[audience applauds] And that was you, right, Kyler?

Yeah, Kyler played some really slick drums.

Give it up for Kyler on drums.

[audience applauds] The soloists on our first tune, who I would be remiss to not announce too, that would be Simon on trumpet.

Give it up for Simon.

[audience applauds] See, my intention is to give you all blisters from clapping so much.

That's my goal.

But if you wanna wait 'til the end to preserve your hands, that's fine too.

Also, Cayden on alto saxophone.

[audience applauds and cheers] And Wes on guitar.

[audience applauds] And we heard from Mason on drums and also Kyler on congas.

[audience applauds] Oh, and we can't forget our, like, super trombonist, who was like... [imitates rapid trombone] Right, that's Ben on trombone.

Whoo!

[audience applauds] See, he's mad because I'm gonna steal his lick.

And then, 'cause I'm a trombonist.

I'm gonna start playing my Ben stuff.

And then he's gonna be like, "What are you doing, man?"

We're gonna continue with a Mary Lou Williams composition that was transcribed by Jazz of Lincoln Center.

This is one of her great pieces, original pieces for big band, where she orchestrated the style of stride piano and boogie-woogie piano to fit the big band.

I think you'll really dig this.

This is called "Roll 'Em."

One, two, ah one, two, three!

["Roll 'Em" by Mary Lou Williams] [piano solo] [audience applauds and cheers] [saxophone solo] [audience applauds and cheers] [trumpet solo] ["Roll 'Em" by Mary Lou Williams] [audience applauds and cheers] Yeah, "Roll 'Em" by Mary Lou Williams.

That was Nick on trumpet.

You heard from Lincoln, you heard from Lincoln on alto saxophone.

You heard from Lily on piano.

[audience applauds and cheers] We're gonna continue with a song that I was really lucky to play with the composer and the band leader.

This is a song that bari saxophonist Jason Marshall wrote for the late, great trumpet player Roy Hargrove, who we lost a few years ago.

Roy made his mark as one of the all-time great jazz musicians.

And this song is called "Ms.

Garvey, Ms.

Garvey."

And it's a shuffle, a blues, it's got everything good and greasy and soulful in it that you could want to play in jazz.

It's gonna feature a lot of people in the band.

So you're gonna hear from Wes again on guitar, you're gonna hear from Simon on baritone saxophone.

You're gonna hear some great trading from Declan and Henry.

You're gonna hear from Grayson on the trumpet.

And you're gonna hear a really cool shout section with the whole band without the rhythm section.

Very unusual, kind of rare thing in big band.

So, we hope you enjoy "Ms.

Garvey, Ms.

Garvey."

One, two, ah one, two, three!

["Ms.

Garvey, Ms.

Garvey" by Jason Marshall] [jazzy big band music] ["Ms.

Garvey, Ms.

Garvey" by Jason Marshall] [audience applauds] [saxophone solo] [audience applauds and cheers] [trombone solo] [trombone solo] [trombone solo] [trombone solo] [trombone solo] [audience applauds] [trumpet solo] [audience applauds] [guitar solo] ["Ms.

Garvey, Ms.

Garvey" by Jason Marshall] [audience applauds and cheers] Whoo!

Wow, how about Declan on bass trombone?

That's my favorite part.

It's cool.

All right, we have, what, yeah, I think, maybe one more for you.

So we're gonna bring out one of our trumpet players.

Adele?

Oh, there she is, there she is, there she is, all right.

That was my joke for the set.

We're gonna feature Adele on a beautiful song written by another one of our great composers who we sadly lost.

It's important in jazz music to respect where the music comes from.

It's about learning the style and the history and the theory and the roots of the music.

So, we like to honor those that come before us and that made it possible for us to play this wonderful art form and to be artists in this way.

That's why we play, you know, so much music and try to have a reverential spirit about those that, you know, braved harder times and used their genius in support of being creative and beautiful in the world.

So, that's why we picked the song called "I Remember Clifford."

Benny Golson wrote it for the great trumpeter Clifford Brown from Wilmington, Delaware, who sadly perished at the very young age of 25 on the way to a gig, driving on a perilous mountain road during a rainstorm in the winter.

So, it's a very sad jazz loss to one of its leading lights.

And Clifford Brown was not just a amazing trumpet player.

He was a very, very special, kind human being, and you'll hear some of that in this music, and certainly from the way that Adele plays it.

We hope you enjoy "I Remember Clifford."

["I Remember Clifford" by Benny Golson] [gentle trumpet music] ["I Remember Clifford" by Benny Golson] ["I Remember Clifford" by Benny Golson] ["I Remember Clifford" by Benny Golson] ["I Remember Clifford" by Benny Golson] [audience applauds and cheers] Give it up for Adele!

[audience applauds and cheers] Okay, okay, we're gonna go a little off script here.

Oh, no!

Do y'all wanna hear something really fast?

– Audience Member: Yeah!

- Yeah?

Well, there's one person I heard.

Y'all really, I mean, I mean, not fast, fast.

I mean as fast as we can play.

[audience cheers] All right, okay, that's a little too much, little too much.

But that's, I'm glad to know the enthusiasm's there.

All right, we're gonna play, we're gonna dig deep and play something as fast as humanly possible.

We're gonna do that for you on this day.

So it's gonna be a little scary in the Halloween tradition, but, you know, we got the orange in the audience.

I see it, I see it out there.

Good look.

Here we go.

– Audience Member: Whoo!

[audience laughs] - Ready?

Ready?

– Band: Yeah!

- One, one, two, ah one, two, three, four!

[band plays single note] All right, thank you!

[audience cheers] Now, back to the previously prepared programming.

We're gonna conclude our portion of today's concert and festivities.

Thank you for being here.

You've been an amazing audience.

We can't make the best music without the best energy, and, you know, being to all 50 states myself, this is the most packed audience I've seen at a music conference, so thank you for being here.

And thank you for sending all the love this way.

Give it up for yourselves and this band.

[audience applauds] I know they've already been thanked before, but I wanna just give-- Oh, okay, that didn't work.

There we go.

And I just wanna thank my buddy Adam Bassak.

He's been helping me so much.

Yeah, I just pointed to the wrong person.

[laughs] He's been great and he really cares about his students, and just wants them to have the best experience, and it's been great getting to know him and be his friend.

So, thank you so much, Adam, for making this work so smoothly.

Thank you.

[audience applauds] On this last tune, we're gonna feature a lot of people.

You're gonna hear from Lily again.

You're gonna hear some great trading between Mason and Noah in the rhythm section.

You're gonna hear a crazy trumpet melody that I can't imagine how they play.

You're gonna hear Charlie do some wicked things on the saxophone that are also appropriately Halloweeny.

And, did I get everybody?

And Johann.

Why can I, how-- Johann actually has a secret talent.

He does impressions.

So if you wanna hear him do some voices, come up after the show.

[audience laughs] All right, but he only works for chocolate chip cookies.

[audience laughs] So, that's important.

But it's been great.

This song is by the amazing, still alive composer Toshiko Akiyoshi.

Actually, Toshiko, to pronounce it correctly.

She's a pioneer in the jazz world.

She's the first woman to graduate with a jazz studies degree from Berkley College of Music.

And she's led her big band for 40 years, and is a amazing, amazing musician.

This is called "After Mr.

Teng."

It's been an honor and a privilege.

My name's Michael Dease.

Thank you so much, everybody.

[audience applauds] One, two, ah one, two, three!

["After Mr.

Teng" by Toshiko Akiyoshi] [upbeat jazz music] ["After Mr.

Teng" by Toshiko Akiyoshi] [piano solo] [audience applauds] [saxophone solo] [audience applauds] [upright bass solo] [drum solo] [audience applauds] [saxophone solo] [audience applauds] [audience applauds and cheers] The 2025 WSMA All-State Jazz Band!

Give it up!

[audience applauds and cheers]