Grantee Spotlight: Livingston Jazz Festival
By Monica Grable
Arts Education Director
For Garrett Stannard, director of bands at Park High School in Livingston, providing his students with access to jazz experiences in the classroom was the foundation from which an ambitious multi-faceted event could be built. Armed with a vision that would extend into the Livingston community and involve professional jazz musicians from across the country, Stannard set out to fully engage his students with a deep dive into world-class jazz artistry and to provide a significant behind-the-scenes performing arts learning experience.
Supported by a grant from the Montana Arts Council’s Artists in Schools and Communities (AISC) program, Park High School hosted its second consecutive Livingston Jazz Festival – two days of super-charged learning experiences for high school students, shared by the community – on Nov. 16-17. Each day of the two-day festival was comprised of a full slate of education sessions, master classes, performances by student musicians and guest artists, and jam sessions held well into the evenings.
Music students from Park’s numerous jazz groups participated in the festival together with ensembles from Belgrade, Bozeman and Montana State University, while students from nearby Gardiner attended along with members of the community to observe the captivating sessions.
Between noon and 4 p.m. each day, 10 guest artists served as clinicians, critiquing and working with ensembles. They also led workshops and master classes on topics such as beginning or advanced improvisation, big band drumming, instrument tips and tricks, the history of music from Africa and jazz composition. Wrapping up the afternoon sessions at 4 p.m. each day was an Informance session—a chance to meet, hear from, and converse with the artists.
Evenings of the Livingston Jazz Festival turned into an all-community affair, with a public concert each night featuring the festival’s guest artists and Park High School’s top jazz ensemble as the opener. Capping off the evenings were late-night jam sessions held in a downtown community-filled venue where students were given the rare opportunity to build their chops by playing alongside the pros – an experience sure to be remembered for life.
A highlight moment of one such session, Stannard recalled, was that of a brave freshman student who’d found himself struggling to work through an improvisation that could have easily been taken over by one of the guest artists. Instead, that artist leaped from the audience to come to the student’s aid, humbly and quietly coaching him along throughout the remainder of the piece.
Throughout the festival, students also learned experientially about the business of performing arts presenting. Twenty-five students – many of whom served as managers or deputy managers in their respective areas of responsibility – held key positions overseeing crucial elements of the festival: facilities and equipment, promotion, hospitality, and sound and lighting.
Lead students in sound and lighting learned from tech professionals the day prior to the festival and subsequently led their own crews on festival days. In addition, students maintained a welcome/check-in desk and acted as “runners,” guiding guests as needed, with one student acting as a “second in command” operating officer, freeing her director to engage with guest artists, supporters, and members of the community.
The adage “it takes a village” could not more aptly apply to the Livingston Jazz Festival. In this second year, the Park High School jazz department saw its web of support grow exponentially, from parent and community volunteers to in-kind donations of food and lodging, to an increase in monetary donations.
What’s more, a growing awareness of, and support for, the bands has taken root, encouraging new goals on the horizon. Currently the PHS Jazz Ensemble is working to fund its way to the All-Northwest Music Festival in Portland this coming February.
To learn more about Park High School’s fantastic band program, visit parkhighbands.org.
Tags: Arts Education