Community Corner
OPRF Jazz Ensemble Rocks Scoville Park
FOR
IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact:
Anthony Svejda 708.434.3101
Oak Park and River Forest High
School’s Award-winning Jazz Ensemble to Perform at Scoville Park Monday, May 19th
Oak
Park, IL – May 5, 2014 – The Jazz Ensemble at Oak Park and River Forest high school (OPRF) will perform a free concert downtown Oak Park, at Scoville Park, on May 19th, from 5:30 p.m. until dark.
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The
performance will be the last of the season for a group that has been recognized
as one of the best jazz ensembles in the state for the past nine years.
“The
OPRF jazz ensemble has won numerous awards,” says Anthony Svejda, Director of
Band at the high school. “Among others, they have received the honor band
status at the Purdue Jazz Festival two years in a row, and have won the
Mundelein Jazz Festival—one of the longest running festivals in the
state—numerous times.”
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“The
talent of the students in the ensemble is quite extraordinary,” adds John
Messina, co-president of APPLAUSE! a non-profit organization that advocates for
the performing arts at OPRF. “Ninety percent of the students who audition make
it to the district level, and a couple of them make it to the state level,
almost every year, as the top players in the state on their instrument.”
The
ensemble will perform pieces by Louis Armstrong, Dizzie Gillespie, and Duke
Ellington, to name a few. Anthony Svejda, himself no stranger to excellence,
will conduct. Svejda was recently selected to conduct the All-state Jazz
Ensemble at next year’s ILMEA All State Convention, an honor he accepted
graciously.
Also
performing on May 19th are the high school’s Jazz Combo and Jazz
Band ensembles.
For
more information, visit OPRF’s band’s Website at https://sites.google.com/site/oprfhsband/ .
* Should it rain that evening, the event will be moved indoors to the High School at 201 N. Scoville Avenue, in the Little Theater right off the school lobby.
Final
5/5/14
