Skule Music Concert is a student-organized concert featuring the engineering music ensembles Skule Orchestra, Stage Band, Stage Band Blue, Brass Ring and Jazz Combo. This one-of-a-kind concert showcases the vast musical talents of over 100 U of T engineering students with an extensive selection of music ranging from classical to jazz.

When: Friday, November 27th 2009 frm 7PM – 9PM
Where: Knox College Chapel, 59 St George St. (Chapel also has its own entrance on King’s College Circle but no specific address.)
Price: Free, but there is a suggested $5 donation for non-students.

The Scott Metcalf Trio will be performing next Friday as part of the Hart House music program that takes place in the beautiful Arbour Room. Here’s what Hart House had to say about the trio:

A newly formed band, conceived of some of the key members of the Cafe Ole, an award winning flamenco jazz ensemble. Although rarely playing as a trio, the members have been playing together for the last 3 years with the Cafe Ole and many other ensembles. The trio have been performing throughout Toronto and the GTA and are all graduates from Humber College’s prestigious music program.

Website: Scott Metcalfe Trio Web Site
When: October 10, 2008 , 9:00 pm
Where: Arbour Room Hart House

Trumpeter Roy Hargrove and his quintet, The Roy Hargrove Quintet, along with a series of special guests, took the stage at Nathan Phillips Square, the Toronto Star Mainstage, last Thursday, June 26th. The concert, part of the Toronto Jazz Festival, paid tribute to the “Jazz at the Philharmonic” series of concerts produced by Norman Granz, first held in Los Angeles in 1944, and featuring some of the era’s top swing and bop musicians like Ella Fitzgerald, Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, and Oscar Peterson.

Although it was oppressively hot outside on Thursday, the plastic seats terribly uncomfortable, and the concert started twenty minutes late, the concert was well worth the wait.

The Quintet opened the evening with Hargrove’s “Depth”, which featured some nice solos from Hargrove’s saxophonist and Hargrove himself. They played a few bop jazz pieces together that jived, and shined whenever Hargrove took centre stage with a solo. His quintet featured musicians that worked great as support but, with the exception of his saxophonist, had trouble finding that clarity, characteristic of all of Hargrove’s excellent solos.

After the first few tunes, jazz guitarist virtuoso Russell Malone, and saxophonist/flautist Frank Wess joined the quintet for a rendition of Dexter Gordon’s “5 Bananas”, which swung with lots of energy. The highlight of this collaboration was “Over the Rainbow”, with Wess on flute, featuring some of the best solos of the concert – in particular Malone’s and Hargrove’s – with a very nice riff on this old familiar tune. (more…)