Wichita State University - Parnassus Yearbook (Wichita, KS)

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CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: Headline attraction for the XIII Wichita Jazz Festival, Mr. Ray Charles sings his monster hit, What'd I Say. 4!29!84 Jeff Lorber plays jazz fusion as the last attraction of the festival. 480184 Stage lights reflect green and red highlights off saxophones downstage. 4!30!84 Saxophonist for Jeff Lorber Fusion solos during their hit, Wizard Island. 4!30!84 Ray Charles draws the audience's applause to his back up vocalists, the Rayettes, and his band during the Ray Charles Show. 4!29!84

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lt's been the policy to have a variety of attractions so you don't get 10 big bands that all play the same thing. We were playing to have a premiere, said Gary Gibson, the band's leader, and Q' they lik- ed it . . . well, they seemed to. We deyinitebf have been given much warrner receptions since then. The Pan America Steel Orchestra is Gibsons dreamchild. ln a way it was a flash Q' inspira- tion. When I first moved down to Texas, my roommate and I were talking about what a drag it was to be down there. I just got this idea, 'Wouldn 't it be great to fubill this dream and have a band and not play garbage? Most W the performers are percussion majors at Wchita State University and receive one hour credit for being part M the group. But the group is not ojicralbf sanctioned by the univer- sity or offered as a course in the music depart- ment. The group is given space in the bowels of Duerksen Fine Arts Center to store equwment - 24 'drums made from 55-gallon oil barrels - and to practice. Funding for the band, mainbf for instruments l and any recorrhng ventures, comes from Gibsons savings and a loan he took out. i Im still paying of the loan. And we have l received some private support. The group is a prokssional band and prides itsel on playing good music, not being locked into T a stereotypical cahpso or reggae mode. The group i also faces another problem in Wchita. T H you don 't play country-and-western in Wchita, Kansas, nobody likes you, Gibson said. But out here at Wchita State, the percus- sionists are further into the future than music students in any other school in the country. That can be debated, M course. The band is planning an album which it hopes to' release through a national label. Otherwise it will promote the record itsef at its concerts. The big point behind the album is that its go- ing to be a cornpleteb' unexpected new sound because people, when they think ofa steel band, think W Marianne and Yellow Bird. The point is to open people up to new sounds. The music then shifted to ,what the ma- jority ofthe audience had been hoping for and expecting. The Navy Commodores Big Band, along with the jazz All Stars - made up of Butch Miles, jay McShann, Herb Ellis, Milt Hinton and Clark Terry,

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Festival To Focus On Acoustic Jazz a regular of the Wichita jazz Festival - played what may be called 'classical' jazz - ballads and tightly arranged big band numbers. The night was also, in a sense, dedicated to the legendary Count Basie, who had died the Thursday before the festival began. After years of trying to schedule it, jazz festival organizers managed to book Basie at the Wichita jazz Festival back in 1979. The Navy Commodores began their pro- gram with a ballad by Basie, dedicated to his memory. Most all of the groups played at least one Basie number, making sure to clearly announce that fact as a way of paying respect. 'The one thing about jazz players that's pretty interestingf Fowler said, 'is when a major artist dies everybody remembers him, tells funny stories about him, eulogizes a lit- tle, but life goes on. That's the way the artist would have wanted it. Basie's band is still playing. I guess it goes back to the old New Orleans days. On Sunday, the XIII jazz Festival moved downtown for the concert at Century II. The program started on time but slowly fell behind schedule. It's become as much of a tradition as the eclecticism of the festival. In 1984, the Sunday concert featured The Navy Commodores, the vocal group Rare Silk, the bluegrass-influenced sounds of David Grisman, the soulful blend of Ray Charles and the Raelettes, the Phil Woods Quintet, and, for the electronic buffs, jeff Lorber Fusion. 'In the past, it's always been the policy to have a wide variety of attrac- tions, Fowler said, 'so you don't get 10 big bands or five groups that all play the same thing. This past year 119842 was quite a departure than we've ever had before,' he said, noting the number of different styles the festival brought it. 'We generally bring in one main attrac- tion,' he said. 'Ray Charles was the main draw last year.' Fowler said there are about four to five thousand regular jazz Festival goers who can be counted on to attend, but in order for the festival to reach its goal of breaking even, they need to bring in another three to four thousand people. A big-name star will help do that, he said. Festival organizers are concerned about how smoothly the program runs and try to avoid delays. During the 1984 jazz Festival, jeff Lorber was scheduled for 10:40 p.m. but, because of delays and the amount of equipment he brought to set up, Lorber did not go on until 1 a.m. 'When you got a group like Weather Report or jeff Lorber who's used to playing as a sole attraction at a concert, that's one thing,' Fowler said. 'When you're part of a festival with maybe 10 other groups, we've got to look at how much setup time that takes, how much extra equipment does that require, do we have the sound capabilities to reinforce the sound the way these people want it to be.' Because of the delays that have gone on in the past, Fowler said it was decided this year that the festival does not have the capabilities for heavy electronic groups. The emphasis will be on more acoustic jazz groups. WSU's involvement .with the educational portion of the festival will continue to ex- pand. The 1984 Homer Osborne award, . given for music education, was presented to WSU's jazz program, the first time any institution has ever received the award. Fowler said the university has established somewhat of a sym- biotic relationship with the festival over the years which has served to promote both WSU and the Wichita jazz Festival. 'I don't know whether we've helped the festival more or the festival has helped us more,' Fowler said. 'It's a mutual kind of thing' Story by Peter Ingmire