Before his performance at the Harker Concert Series, renowned jazz pianist Taylor Eigsti, bassist John Shifflett and drummer Jason Lewis held a master class in the Nichols Hall auditorium for upper and middle school students to help them improve their musicianship both as individuals and members of a group.
Students gathered around Eigsti as he sat at the piano and offered his advice. When improvising, he told the students, it is good to “leave a little of space” so that he can hear what his bandmates are doing and perhaps give them some room to add flourishes of their own.
The upper school jazz band played their rendition of John Coltrane’s “Blue Train” for the trio, who then gave them advice on how to improve, warning them against cutting into one another’s soloing time and advising them to be mindful of signals from their band mates.
Taylor Eigsti returned to a sold-out Nichols Hall auditorium on Sept. 28 to kick off the third season of the Harker Concert Series. Performing to a very enthusiastic crowd, the 27-year-old jazz piano phenom again dazzled an audience made up of everyone from budding jazz fans to longtime aficionados.
The slow, lilting chords of Eigsti’s version of the jazz standard “Cheryl” coursed through the auditorium as the show began, expertly punctuated by veteran drummer Jason Lewis’ light cymbal hits. The trio soon brought up the volume, with Eigsti bassist John Shifflett playing in fast, tight harmony. Never one to chew up scenery, Eigsti gave Shifflett and Lewis ample room to display their knack for tasteful soloing, in addition to showcasing his own immense chops.
“Speaking Song,” one of Eigsti’s own compositions, started with a fast, tricky solo filled with arpeggios and wide intervals, flowing into a strident and confident melody. Following Shifflett’s melodious bass solo, the band shifted into a gallop during Eigsti’s solo, culminating in a raucous middle section before mellowing for the ending.
For the last song of the first set, a rendition of Kenny Dorham’s “Lotus Blossom,” the trio was joined by Eigsti’s longtime friend and Harker middle school music teacher Dave Hart on trumpet. Hart navigated the songs shifting times and rhythms in seemingly effortless fashion, and also showcased his formidable improvisational skills.
During the intermission, several guests at the show remarked about the quality of the venue and reception.
“It’s wonderful,” said Vickie Grove of Portola Valley, a longtime Taylor Eigsti fan who attended last year’s concert. “I love the venue. It’s small. The food is excellent. It’s really fun.”
Kim Huynh, who lives in San Jose, decided to attend after being impressed with her experience seeing pianist Adam Golka last season, saying she enjoyed the “very nice reception. It was exceptional. It was great.”
The second set had some more surprises, including another guest turn by Dave Hart on “Declan,” written by Lewis and named after his son, and a powerful performance on vocals by the young and talented Laila Smith on “Midnight After Noon,” written by Eigsti with Becca Stevens.
Among the more emotionally charged pieces performed was “Distressed,” which Eigsti composed for the 2011 film “Detachment,” starring Adrien Brody. Fittingly, Eigsti performed with no accompaniment for this brooding piece, which was at times also dissonant, plodding and atmospheric.
Eigsti finished the show with the uplifting, groove-driven “Magnolia,” whose rousing mid-section and calming final moments drew a well-deserved extended ovation.
Gillian Wallin, grade 10, performed with her band, AUX Input, at the Celebrate Saratoga street festival on Sept. 16. Wallin, who also plays in the upper school jazz band, plays drums in the band, which performed for the thousands of patrons who attend the festival each year.
This article was originally published in the fall 2012 Harker Quarterly.
Many of Harker’s performing arts faculty enhanced their professional resumes this summer, returning to Harker with new stories and new skills.
Jenny Sandusky, who leads lower and upper school vocal ensembles, went on tour to Los Angeles with Ragazzi, a Grammy award-winning boys chorus based on the peninsula. Sandusky is the group’s associate artistic director.
Karl Kuehn, upper school dance teacher, also connected with Ragazzi. “I worked [with them] on choreography for their upcoming season,” he notes. Kuehn also taught a summer dance intensive at Atlas School of Dance in San Jose and attended the Dance Teacher’s Summit in New York City, where participants took part in movement sessions, seminars and workshops led by expert teachers.
Monica Colletti, middle school performing arts teacher, visited the famed Second City organization in Chicago. “I worked on my improvisation skills in a week-long intensive course in improv and sketch writing,” she said. Second City is a top-notch theater and improvisation group that has produced countless Saturday Night Live alumni.
Danny Dunn, lower school technical director, wrote and directed two circus shows in the month of July and found outlets for a wide variety of skills across various media including finishing another children’s book.
Every summer, Jeff Draper, upper school performing arts teacher and dean of the class of 2013, is the education director at Young Rep, a theater workshop in Walnut Creek now in its 39th year. He directed and taught classes as varied as British scene study performance, Shakespeare in performance, a make-up master class and an advanced voice and speech class. He also taught film acting: “A lot of film equipment that I learned how to use and edit with, I will be using at Harker this fall.”
Upper school music teacher Susan Nace participated in Harker’s Tamagawa teacher exchange program. Read the full story here.
Finally, Laura Lang-Ree, K-12 performing arts department chair, worked on both her directing skills and her theater skills at the Broadway Teachers Workshop in New York City, a course that brings in current Broadway professionals to work with participants. She took courses on script analysis, vocal interpretation and dance. Lang-Ree is also the vocalist for the Los Gatos/Saratoga Big Band, and performed with them at Santana Row and the San Jose Jazz Festival.
This article was originally published in the fall 2012 Harker Quarterly.
Located on Harker’s lower school campus, Summer Camp+, where K-6 students have a full morning of academics followed by fun, action- packed afternoon activities, offers full, partial-day and morning-only options.
Students have the choice of enrolling in either Core Focus or LoL (Learning opportunities in Literature). Both programs conclude at 11:30 a.m. to make room for an afternoon activity program. Core Focus is a three- or four-week math and language arts-focused program. LoL is a two-week integrated curriculum centered around a literary theme.
This year, a spirited four-way game of “color clash” kicked off the beginning of Summer Camp+. The traditional event, held in the bucknall gymnasium, saw team groups yellow, red, green and blue competing in an array of activities coached by enthusiastic camp counselors. Wearing hula skirts, capes and silly hats, counselors kept the huge room filled with enraptured campers. It was all part of an effort to unite and welcome Harker’s youngest summer camp participants as a group.
Standing near a door leading out to the gym’s lobby, the camp’s art specialist Arwen Lange explained, “This was an easy way to bring all the campers together in one spot, to unite them as a group and raise the camp spirit.” Lange, who also works as assistant director of the lower school’s BEST program, said this is her second year working at the summer camp, an endeavor she plans to continue.
Officiating at the event was Joe Chung, director of Summer Camp+, who took center stage, flanked by colorful balloons and banners celebrating the teams. Decked out in yellow and sporting a bright hat adorned with a huge slice of cheese, he held timed contests for the enthusiastic campers. During one event, the pass the hula hoop activity, there was a four-way tie … a first time in camp history!
New this year, under the rubric of morning academics, were expanded music workshops open to instrumental students entering grades 2-6 with at least one year of experience playing violin, viola, cello, bass, flute, oboe, clarinet, saxophone, trumpet, French horn, trombone, guitar, piano or percussion.
These two-week workshops offered exposure to music theory and composition, improvisation, ear training, singing, ensembles and full orchestral playing. A concert was performed at the end of each session and a recording and printed score given to each student.
“Making music can be isolating,” said Louis Hoffman, Harker’s K-5 instrumental coordinator, who started the program with the goal of keeping his students playing over the summer. “often what happens with learning an instrument is that kids work hard all year, then stop during the summer, and have to start over or even worse, get frustrated and quit. My goal is to keep students engaged.”
Indeed, noted Chung, keeping young students engaged over the summer, no matter what camp option they ultimately select, is the overriding goal of Summer Camp+.
This article was originally published in the fall 2012 Harker Quarterly.
This summer Harker varsity and junior varsity dancers won a number of awards and earned the opportunity to perform in Hawaii and London.
The United Spirit Association Dance Camp, held in July at the University of California, Santa Cruz, featured classes on technique and choreography and also featured a number of competitive challenges. Under the guidance of upper school dance teachers Amalia De La Rosa and Karl Kuehn, the Harker dancers won several awards.
The group comprised Ria Desai, Mi- chaela Kastelman and Molly Wolfe, grade 12; Jenny Dai, grade 11; Noel Ba- nerjee, Darby Millard, Erika Olsen and Jacqui Villarreal, grade 10; and Selin Ozcelik, Emily Pan, Kristen Park, Ankita Sharma and Madison Tomihiro, grade 9.
As a group, the Harker dance group was awarded a “superior” plaque, the highest group recognition at the camp, and was invited to perform at next year’s NFL Pro Bowl in Hawaii. They also won the teamwork challenge and received an award for being the most improved team at the camp.
Kastelman, Millard and Villarreal were recognized as All-American dancers, an honor that included an invitation to perform in London with the United Spirit Association. For their overall technique and performance acumen, Kastelman, Banerjee, Millard and Villarreal all received “super sensational” ribbons. Millard and Kastelman reached the final round of competition and were among the top 10 dancers at the camp.
Desai’s and Sharma’s efforts in drill classes earned them first- place ribbons and Park and Ozcelik received second-place ribbons. In the drill competition, Sharma received a medallion for her second-place finish.
“It was really fantastic seeing the dancers take classes and participate with dance teams from all over California,” said Kuehn, noting that the students did a fantastic job representing Harker’s dance program.
“I am hoping the students walked away with a greater sense of team unity and Harker pride. This camp gave them a preview of what life is like as a professional dancer – taking classes, working on choreography and rehearsing all day long,” he said.
The junior varsity team is now working on their routine for the family picnic and the varsity troupe will be preparing for the homecoming festivities.
According to De La Rosa, a huge benefit was having members of both junior varsity and varsity participate, bringing together the whole dance department. “The dancers had an opportunity to challenge themselves both individually and as a team,” she added.
In July, student dancer Christopher Hildum, grade 10, was declared the winner of the Mr. Dance America title at the Kids Artistic Review National Dance Competition held in Las Vegas. He also took second place in the “Intermediate Solo 15-19” category. Hildum, who has been participating in the competition for 10 years, was first runner up for the Junior Mr. Dance America title at the finals of the 2006-07 season of the competition.
Upper school music teacher Susan Nace visited Tamagawa Gakuen in Tokyo as part of this year’s teacher exchange. Nace spent the duration of her trip, which started in late June and lasted through the first week of July, teaching classes to students in grades 8, 10 and 11.
“I had a lot to share about vocal and choral techniques that were unknown to them,” Nace said. “I also shared some of my teaching materials.”
Nace found that the students were very receptive and eager to learn, and that the teachers “were very curious and interested in vocal pedagogy, as their choral teachers are instrumentally trained.” She was also impressed with how musically trained the Tamagawa students were. “Everyone sings in a choir and takes art classes every year,” she said. “Each of the upper grades has its own choir, which sings major works. They have several large lecture/recital halls and music rooms in which to hold rehearsals.”
Aside from teaching, Nace also had many opportunities to experience the rich Japanese culture, visiting the famous Rikugien Garden and sampling many different foods, including “every conceivable way to eat tofu, conger eel, salmon roe, cockles and fish that I am unfamiliar with.”
The students even taught her a bit of Japanese. “One taught me to write my name in katakana so that I could sign her songbook!”
In May, Andree Beals ’12 was awarded a four-year scholarship from George Washington University’s Presidential Scholars in the Arts program. GWU’s department of theater and dance offers this award to incoming freshmen studying the disciplines of dance, acting or design and technical production. Beals received the scholarship after submitting an application and performing an audition.
“I am extremely honored to be given this scholarship and cannot wait to dance at GW,” Beals said. “I’m glad that my time as a company member at [Teen Dance Company], a contemporary dance company in the Mountain View, as well as my work with other San Francisco choreographers, has moved me forward into such a great dance program.”
At the United Spirit Association Dance Camp, held in July at the University of California, Santa Cruz, Harker varsity and junior varsity dancers won a number of awards and earned the privilege of performing in Hawaii and London. Students in attendance at the camp were grade 12 students Ria Desai, Michaela Kastelman and Molly Wolfe, grade 11 student Jenny Dai, grade 10 students Noel Banerjee, Darby Millard, Erika Olsen and Jacqui Villarreal and grade 9 students Selin Ozcelik, Emily Pan, Kristen Park, Ankita Sharma and Madison Tomihiro.
The camp featured classes on technique and choreography and also featured a number of competitive challenges. Under the guidance of dance teachers Amalia De La Rosa and Karl Kuehn, the dancers won several awards. Kastelman, Millard and Villarreal were recognized as All-American dancers, an honor that included an invitation to perform in London with the United Spirit Association. For their overall technique and performance acumen, Kastelman, Banerjee, Millard and Villarreal all received Super Sensational ribbons. Millard and Kastelman reached the final round of competition and were among the top 10 dancers at the camp.
The Harker dance group was awarded a “Superior” plaque, the highest group recognition at the camp, and was invited to perform at next year’s NFL Pro Bowl in Hawaii. They also won the teamwork challenge and received an award for being the most-improved team at the camp.
Desai’s and Sharma’s efforts in drill classes earned them first-place ribbons and Park and Ozcelik received second-place ribbons. In the drill competition, Sharma received a medallion for her second-place finish.