During last week’s Latin jazz performance, my expectations were immediately surpassed. The musicians turned out to be really great and the show was spectacular. However, I did not expect the room to be that small. On one hand, the sound was closer to the audience, and you were able to see the people paying the instruments, up close, but on the other hand, the sound was not able to spread out due to the bad acoustics in that room. Aware of the issue, curtains were placed around the walls, which only helped a little.

If I had to choose a favorite piece, it would be the first one. Not only was it always, should I say, exciting, but the rhythm which it brought about was also the best, [in my opinion]. Although the others were also good, I feel that they had some bland spots, where they either held a beat too long, or simply were not as exciting.

As a comment to Vaughn’s comment on Baby Jack in class the lecture before, I would have to agree. After hearing it, I did understand why it was “funny”. The saxophone really did sound like a babies cry, and that provided a great contribution to the whole point/theme of the piece (to demonstrate how quickly the mood of a baby can change).

As a minor  observation, I did notice that the instruments in latin jazz were grouped differently. Upon further thought, the reason to this was that the grouped instruments tended to play at the same time, and whenever Arthur O’Farrell did conduct, he signaled all of the musicians from that specific group. Aside from this, there were musicians on the side (not on stage) which I only noticed at the end when I started wondering where the sound of their instruments was coming from.

Overall, I really appreciate the performance. As a musician of multiple instruments, I know how many hours of practice it must’ve taken to get each piece perfect. All of the musicians did a great job that night, and I will definitely look out for similar concerts at Brooklyn College.

  • Benjamin K