Essay on Performance Critique

Submitted By Steph7261
Words: 582
Pages: 3

Name
11.20.14
MUL1010
Professor Locke-Willaims
The concert I attended was at the Rose & Alfred Miniaci Performing Arts Center in Ft Lauderdale. The concert performed by the Sublime Saxophone Summit. They performed jazz music dating back to the 1930s, were jam sessions or “cutting contests,” where the participants competed onstage. The three men that performed at this concert were Jimmy Heath, Benny Golson, and Javon Jackson.
There were many parts of the music that struck me as being beautiful, one being that the musicians looked like they understood the importance of each piece of music and that they appeared to be so intensely involved with the power of the music. The music was also beautiful in more than one way. We normally associate beauty with music that is very happy and lively sounding. There were parts of the performance that were dark and at times it sounded mournful to some extent, and that is another type of beauty. I really enjoyed the variety of music that was played at the concert. It was music that you could listen to for a long time and just sit back and meditate and think. It brought joy to the heart and also made the point that when you hear music that is more dark and mournful like it can still be enjoyable.
The dynamics were truly amazing there were parts with dynamics that changed very slowly or that would gradually decrescendo till the sounds dissipated. There were also other instances with quick rises or crescendos of volume that added to the texture of the music. At times dynamics were used to set or to change the mood. The musicians started out with a very powerful and dramatic beginning to gain your attention. Then with the constant change of dynamics, it would gain your attention again at the ending of the more dark and mournful parts with an explosion of a higher dynamic level.
Another thing that added to the impact of the concert was the adding and removing the instruments throughout the pieces of music. In the music of Mozart, the Menuetto in canone presented this idea very well. A saxophone started with such a joyous and bouncy sound. After, the