Maine Motif Issue 3, Vol. II (Spring 2018) | Page 36

Jazz Sessions
Mike Sakash, Jazz VP
Many of this year’s jazz sessions are geared toward teachers who wish to start a jazz
program for the first time, or improve the curricular design of their existing jazz
programs. We are very excited that the All-State Honors Jazz Band conductor, and
Belwin Jazz composer, Kris Berg, will be returning to Maine
to provide a clinic on teaching bass line construction to
middle school and high school bass players. The session is
designed for those who have never addressed bass line
construction with their students, as well as those teachers
who have experience in this area already. For a young bass
player creating a bass line that outlines a given chord
structure can be a mysterious process. Kris’s very methodic
approach to bass instruction will be very informative to
novice and experienced jazz educators alike. Kris is not only
and in-demand bassist, but he is a widely acclaimed composer
and arranger whose music is currently available through the
Belwin Jazz label.
Saxophone articulation and inflection are essential in the
training of a big band saxophone section. Director of Jazz
Studies at UNH, Dr. Nate Jorgensen, has years of
experience working with middle school, high school, and
collegiate saxophonists. His clinic titled Big Band Sax
Section will cover the roles and responsibilities of each
member of the saxophone section in a typical big band
setting. In the clinic he will discuss balance and blend, who
and what to listen for, and who your saxophonists should be
listening to in the rest of the band.  Members of the
Portland Jazz Orchestra saxophone section will provide
demonstrations of the concepts Dr. Jorgensen will cover.
With extensive classical saxophone experience as well, Dr.
Jorgensen will present Saxophone 102: What I Never
Learned In Woodwind Pedagogy