The 25th Annual Bellevue College Jazz Band Festival

Please, click on the bottom below to start your registration.

Erena Terakubo was born in Sapporo, Japan. She began playing the alto saxophone at the age of nine. Terakubo played the saxophone influenced by artists such as Charlie Parker, Cannonball Adderley, and Sonny Stitt.

In 2010, Terakubo released her first album, “North Bird” with Kenny Barron, Christian McBride, Lee Pearson, and Peter Bernstein, through Japanese major label King Records. It marked No. 1 on the Japanese jazz charts and was awarded Swing Journal’s Gold Disc. Later that year, she performed with Ron Carter, Omar Hakim, and Will Boulware at the Tokyo Jazz Festival. In 2011, Terakubo recorded her second album, “New York Attitude” with Kenny Barron, Ron Carter, Lee Pearson, and Dominick Farinacci. In the same year, she received a presidential scholarship from Berklee College of Music. She graduated in 2015. She moved to New York in the same year.

Terakubo has performed with Kenny Barron, Ron Carter, Jimmy Cobb, Louis Hayes, Vincent Herring, Christian McBride, John Beasley’s Monk’estra, Lewis Nash, and Lenny White just to name a few. In addition, Terakubo has toured around the globe as a leader including Asia, Europe, Africa, South America, Australia, and the Middle East. Terakubo released 6 albums as a leader.

1. FRIDAY: Middle/Jr High Schools – 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.: 20-minute performance, 35-minute clinic.
2. SATURDAY: High Schools – 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.: 25-minute performance, 45-minute clinic.
3. High School Combo Division.
4. Live streaming of daytime performances.
5. CD recording of each group’s performance & Judge Comments.
6. State of the art sound reinforcement.
7. Masterclass and performance by Guest Artist.
8. Competitive or “Comment-Only” option.
9. Awards will be given at the end of the day and evening concert.
10. Awards will include outstanding bands and outstanding soloists
11. Saturday Evening Concert is free to all participants

BC’s Jazz Band, directed by Jim Sisko, will host the 25th annual Bellevue College Jazz Band Festival. There will be 40  Middle School, High School and College Jazz Bands and Combos participating over two days.

Schedule

Friday, Feb. 3, will be an all day event for Middle Schools from 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Friday will come to an end presenting the top three schools with special recognition in addition to a special presentation of 8 individual awards.

Saturday, Feb. 4,  from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., the High schools will compete.  At 5 p.m. the top three schools will be selected for the evening concert. The evening concert will start at 8 p.m. with the top three high schools performing followed by a performance by own BC Jazz Band with guest artist Erena Terakubo.

Guest artist saxophonist Erena Terakubo will be performing at a clinic on Friday & Saturday during the lunch hour; as well as, performing with the BC Jazz Band in the Saturday evening concert.

Award Announcement 

At the end of the Junior High and Middle School competition on Friday, soloist awards, a winner and two runners up will be selected and announced.  At the end of the day on Saturday, soloist awards will be announced and three high school bands will be selected to perform in the evening concert. All high school bands, including those that perform on Friday are eligible to be selected as showcase bands on the Saturday evening concert.  Places are determined solely by the afternoon scoring.  The three showcase bands will lead off the Saturday evening concert, and the performance order will be determined by a random draw.

Traditionally, junior high and middle school bands have performed on Friday and high school bands have performed on Saturday.  If needed, we are happy to host a high school band on Friday if it helps with your travel arrangements.

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