Date:
9/18/2009
Contact: Wendel Sloan at 575.562.2253
PORTALES—Eastern New Mexico University’s Christopher Beaty, associate professor of music and director of the jazz studies program, will perform a saxophone faculty recital at 7 p.m. on Friday, Sept. 25, at the First United Methodist Church in Portales. Beaty will give a repeat performance of the concert at 7:30 p.m. (CST) on Monday, Sept. 28, at South Plains College in Levelland, Texas.
Kayla Paulk will accompany Beaty on piano and Jennifer Laubenthal will lend her talents on clarinet in her first public performance, according to Beaty.
Though Beaty is known for his jazz interests, he is playing the repertoire of three American and one Australian composers. “With the saxophone being associated with jazz a lot, you get a lot of jazz influenced pieces in the classical saxophone repertoire but none of these were directly influenced by jazz” says Beaty.
He will perform “Sonata” by Paul Creston, “Sonata” by Robert Muczynski, “KuKu” by Barry Cockcroft and “Mood Music 2” by Glenn Smith.
“This is all music from the 20th century. I’m playing music from 1935 on up to 1997,” says Beaty. Creston’s “Sonata” was chosen because many of Beaty’s saxophone majors may include it in their standard repertoire studies while majoring in saxophone at ENMU. It is also one of the most popular pieces written for saxophone.
Playing the piece “KuKu,” which in Swahili is “chicken,” is a new experience for Beaty who has never played an Australian composer’s piece before. “It’s unaccompanied so you have to be a ‘one-man band.’ It’s really modern and kind of humorous since the back half of it is meant to sound like a chicken,” says Beaty.
Instead of an intermission, Beaty’s 11-year-old daughter, Emma, will perform a violin piece with Paulk’s accompaniment. “She’s [Emma] a pretty advanced Suzuki violinist, taught by her mother since she was two,” he says. Beaty’s wife, Eileen McNaughton, has been teaching the Suzuki violin method for over 20 years.
The performance is free and open to the public. For more information, contact Kathi Fraze at 575.562.2377.