After a brief  introduction by Mike Vax, Rhythm & Brass opened with Contrapunctus #1, from Bach's Art of the Fugue. They played this at a langourous tempo, highlighting the rich harmonies.  This arrangement broke up some of the lines between the trumpet players, so each traded short phrases rather than having one trumpeter playing the longer line. I found this interesting and effective.  Also of interest is that the trumpeters, trombonist and hornist all played standing up. This allowed them to interact more and enhanced the visual aspect of the performance a great deal.

Rhythm & Brass next played a pleasant arrangement of a Beck tune called Jackass. Not your usual brass quintet fair, this piece was pleasant and worked just fine in this setting. Taking another musical right turn, the quintet (minus percussion) played Orlando di Lasso's Quem vidistis pastores. substituting flugelhorns for trumpets gave hymn-like piece a very warm rounded sound.

John Coltrane's Syeeda's Flute Songs was played by the sextet, with the hornist moving to piano.  Here, this group played jazz much more convincingly than many other brass quintets who try to cross over. There was more to it than simply including drums and piano. The trumpeters and the trombonist are all accomplished jazz soloists, and Villarubia is able to imitate standard jazz bass playing on tuba like no other.  Trumpeter Rex Richardson delivered the opening solo on this tune, playing a frantic, almost angry solo, with wide double-tongued jumps, as fellow trumpeter Wiff Rudd (trumpet players have the best names!) and trombonist Tom Brantley played background lines and accents. The trumpet players went to mutes as they played background behind the trombone solo. Brantley has that extroverted, brash Stan Kenton-ish sound which I love.  The muted trumpets were almost inaudible, though.

Next on the program were four pieces by Dmitri Shostakovich. The first piece, the Polka from The Golden Age, was played by the sextet, with the percussionist on xylophone. The ensemble went from raucous to ,delicate, loud to soft, with ease.  The trumpeters switched to flugel for the Contradance, a very Russian sounding hymn-like piece. Gluck again pulled out the melodica for Barrel Organ, which also featured piccolo trumpet. The tuba took a break on this one. The last of these pieces, The Bureaucrat Polka, was a mish-mash of styles, sounding at times like a march, or a German cabaret song, or circus-music. Obviously, this was Shostakovich's pointed musical comment about the Russian bureaucracy.

Next, tubist Charles Villarrubia was down front and center, playing the Arban's version of The Carnival of Venice, accompanied by Alex Shuhan on piano. Harvey Phillips would be pleased! What a light and effortless sound, not at all ponderous, as one might expect from a tuba.  Villarrubia made it seem easy, though after one of the variations, he wiped his brow, causing everybody to laugh. Villarrubia got a well-deserved standing ovation at the conclusion.

The first half of this concert ended with Awakenings (Tuesday Morning) written by the hornist, Alex Shuhan. Introducing the piece, he said "Sometimes you wish you hadn't called home from the road." It began with bass drum (played by Brantley) and orchestra bells, intoning a dirge-like pulse, suggesting on ominous sunrise. They were joined by the rest of the brass in a shrieking hellish fanfare, like some twisted wake-up call.  Many of the themes sounded nightmarish. The muted trumpets played in half-steps against a 2-note piano ostinato, then the horn played over another ostinato, this time on vibraphone. The trumpets again switched to flugels, with Richardson soloing over a background of flugel, horn, trombone and vibes. The tuba introduced a repeated jazz theme, which had an urban West-Side Story feel. Richardson continued soloing, playing from the bottom to the top of the horn (probably F or G) in an angular fashion. The trombone took over before the entire ensemble played a unison jazz theme to end this piece. That must have been some phone call!

Rhythm & Brass opened the second half of their concert with a short piece, Roof Garden Music (composed guess where?) which began with two players on small bells, who were joined gradually by the rest of the group, also on percussion. This was followed by Divertimento, by Karel Husa. Alex Shuban explained that they were using a special arrangement of a previous re-arrangement by the composer, based on Czechoslavakian folk themes.

It being the 100th anniversary of Duke Ellington's birth, R&B played a medley of his music. Cotton Club Stomp began with a killer tuba bass line, and continued to swing as the rest of the band joined in. At one point, I had to look up from my note-taking to see who was playing clarinet, and was surprised when it turned out to be a piccolo trumpet! Concerto for Cootie (aka Do Nothing Till You Hear From Me) featured Wiff Rudd in another authentic reproduction of Cootie Williams' plunger-mute style (Jon Faddis was the first to pay homage at this week's conference). The next piece began with an Erik Satie-like (Gnossiennes) piano theme with an Eastern flavor, and flowed into Amad, which had a Middle-East-meets New-Orleans-2d-line feel. This snake-charmin' music segued into Caravan, which also featured a New-0rleans march-style swing. Both trumpet players and the trombone player were great soloists throughout this and other jazz pieces, and the tuba player lays down a great bass line.