The Jazz Alliance of Cedar City performed their monthly show at Off The Cuff Comedy on Sept. 9 at 7 p.m.
The theme of the show was “Tour de Jazz,” and the House Band Trio took the audience from 1920s blues to modern-day style jazz. The program included tunes such as “Mercy, Mercy, Mercy” in 1960s style and an original piece by the band’s pianist, Christian Bohnenstengel, titled “Silver Reef.”
The band played to a nearly full house, forcing venue staff to set up overflow chairs to accommodate the influx of attendees.
“Music is life, and these guys are carrying on tradition; they’re doing things live and in person that are not being replaced with computers and AI,”said audience member Christopher England. “It’s nice to see real musicians doing real music and really feeling it.”
The concert complemented the new jazz music history class offered at Southern Utah University.
“The more we know about a style of music and the history, the more we appreciate it and the more we are able to hear the intricate details of the music,” said Bohnenstengel.
Alongside being the trio’s pianist and bassist, Christian Bohnenstengel is also a professor at SUU, currently teaching this new course.
“I’m most excited that I get to learn probably more than my students do,” said Bohnenstengel. “I’ve been playing jazz for a long time, but mostly piano related, but now I get to go back and fill in all the blanks, starting with the New Orleans jazz and then spreading to Chicago and New York.”
The class is structured so that students begin learning about early jazz in the 19th century and are led through the genre’s history to the present.
“(Jazz is) America’s music. It’s one of the few (genres) that mostly originated here and expanded here. It’s improvisatory and not everything is set and rigid like some other (genres), so I think it’s important to explore that,” said saxophonist Thomas Herb.
The Jazz Alliance of Cedar City performs on the second Tuesday of each month at OTC Comedy. Their next show is Oct. 14 at 7 p.m. and is free for all to attend.
