Why This Weekend Was Crazy Enough to Write About It:

Being involved in many music programs as a high school student has its perks, but sometimes I find myself diving head first into weekends like these:

1. Saturday, 7:30 am: The SAT.

There’s nothing much to say about this one except for the fact that it pretty much rendered me useless for the rest of the day.

2. Saturday, 2-4 pm: CAP @ CalArts

I’ll elaborate further on my experience with this program next week, when we’ll be having our last class. But in a nutshell, I’m taking two classes out of the ten or so offered: Theory II/Composition and Jazz Ensemble. I took the composition class in hopes that it would help me with improvisation — but I’ve learned so much more than just that. I’d tried composing before, but this is the first time I’ve actually successfully started and finished a piece — I wrote it based on some of the ii-V7-I chords  in the Alice in Wonderland performed by Bill Evans (it’s my all-time favorite jazz ballad). On the other hand, I’ve taken this Jazz Ensemble class for about a year and a half with several different teachers (including Jon Armstrong) — this year, it’s James Lewis and Tina Raymond.

Currently we’re rehearsing Lady Bird, Alice in Wonderland, and a B-flat blues piece we wrote as a class. But sometimes James takes the liberty of sitting us down and teaching us “life lessons;” he’ll give us a short speech about how to be better musicians and better people in general — it’s often a humorously serious experience. This week it was about the importance of humility — in James’s opinion, one of the most important requirements of being a musician is having a sense of humility: “there’s no ‘there’ in music,” he says, “you’re never ‘there’…never think more of yourself than that.”

3. Saturday, 6:30 pm: SCVYO Concert @ COC Performing Arts Center

I’ve been involved with the SCVYO program for a little less than three years — I’m a firm believer in keeping a balance between jazz and classical (especially when I listen to someone like Hiromi Uehara). I got to play along with the orchestra in a Corelli double concerto. There’s definitely something comforting about having all the notes in front of you after being in front of play-what-sounds-right chord changes every morning. And there’s this sense of security in the fact that each orchestra part is like a cell of a living, breathing organism — each part isn’t much without the other.

4. Sunday, 9:30 am: West Ranch HS Jazz Band Concert @ Westfield Valencia Mall

That picture at the beginning of this post? Yup, I’m standing right next to Jeff Babko — he’s my jazz band director’s (Robert Babko) son. Hopefully my standing next to him allowed some of his amazing piano skills to rub off on me; I’m really depending on it. :)

Remember that combo I was talking about earlier? We finally got to perform for the first time — given that we only had one rehearsal to get Santa Claus is Coming to Town together, I think we did a pretty great job. The combo includes me on piano, Omer Benyamin on the tenor sax, Josef Staley on trombone, Diego Kiner on drums, and Brandon Canada on bass. (Watch it below! My solo starts 1:30.)

As always, thanks to Mr. Babko and everyone in the jazz band — they’re all the reason that I love jazz this much.

CURRENTLY LISTENING TO: Give Me The Proof/Tower of Power/Urban Renewal