Backing Jason Moran, Kenwood students get experience of a lifetime

When the celebrated jazz pianist and multimedia artist Jason Moran comes to Symphony Center on Nov. 22 to perform a tribute to jazz pioneer James Reese Europe, he won’t be alone onstage. Far from it. In addition to his group of 10 musicians, he’ll be joined by the acclaimed 80-piece Kenwood Academy High School Marching Band. Kenwood’s music department chair and director of bands, Gerald D. Powell, talked about Kenwood’s decade of work with Moran and what it has meant to him and his students.

This isn’t the first time you and Kenwood band members have worked with Jason Moran. How did your partnership with him begin?

We were doing the Chicago Jazz Festival in the summer of 2013, and [pianist/composer] Bethany Pickens was slated to do some original compositions with the [Kenwood jazz] band that year. Her dad [the Chicago jazz pianist] Willie Pickens had been in communication with Jason Moran, and said, "Man, you should come hear this Kenwood jazz band. My daughter’s doing a couple of original works with them, and they’re a really good group.” And so he kind of promoted us and invited Jason out to come hear Kenwood.

Then Jason said he wanted to do some things with the group. But you [initially] shrug it off. Like, OK, whatever. And then it happens. Jason came through big time and kept coming through. In 2014, we rehearsed with him virtually and in person for “Looks of a Lot” [which debuted at Symphony Center]. And it was a wonderful experience for the students. Just a great project to be part of. Jason was excited about it, too, and happy enough with our performance that a few years later he took the same work and Kenwood to the Kennedy Center in 2017. We also had the opportunity to go into the studio and record with him.

There’s got to be a lot of pressure when someone of Jason’s magnitude and talent comes in. How did and do the kids respond?

They respond well, and I believe it’s because they’re not really wrapping their minds around it yet. They don’t fully feel the weight and the magnitude of the moment and the situation. But you look back years later and it’s like, man, what did we just do? One of the kids who was part of the 2017 project at the Kennedy Center is on staff here at Kenwood as a P.E. instructor. But he’s also my drum-line coach. The drum line will be on display at Symphony Center.

What role does the marching band play in Moran’s James Reese Europe meditation piece that you’ll help him perform?

I think he’s always, in a sense, trying to provide some youthful energy. And not only energy, but connection — making a historical connection and bringing it up to the present. With James Reese Europe, we’re talking about the father of big bands, and also, what we now call marching bands. So we want to try to provide that historical perspective and help the kids understand what was happening during that time, while also giving the program that sense of youthfulness.

I’m sure Jason has an idea of how he wants his group [10 musicians] to mesh with our group [80 musicians], the sounds that he hears, where we can be inserted, where we’re going to fade out — those types of things. It’s just sequencing it all together. So we’re going to be very flexible, as far as that’s concerned. It’s going to be a weaving in and out of the different works. The challenge is making sure that we blend musically and have great transitions.

What’s Jason’s style of working with the kids at Kenwood?

Jason is forthright. He’s real. He wants them to be comfortable. More than just playing the music, he wants them to have an actual experience. That’s what he’s provided for us these years that we’ve been working together. It’s a once-in-a-lifetime experience for our students.