‘The place you want to be': How a Melbourne teenager went from watching YouTube to a New York stage
New York: When Anna Yamazaki was starting high school in Melbourne, clips from the Essential Ellington jazz program in New York City started popping up among her YouTube suggestions.
The competition attracts the crème de la crème of school jazz bands from across North America, who gather at the Lincoln Centre in Manhattan to play Duke Ellington tracks and other big band standards. For budding jazz musicians around the world, it's the north star.
'I've watched Ellington for years and years, and it's always been a 'what if' thought,' says Yamazaki, 17, who is now in year 12. 'I never thought it would become a reality.'
Yamazaki and 19 other students from Blackburn High School, a public school in Melbourne's east, will perform in the Big Apple this week after being selected as finalists for the competition's special 30th anniversary instalment.
They are one of just three international school bands invited, the others being from Japan and Spain. In total, 30 schools will compete over four days, starting with the first round on Friday, local time.
The Blackburn High band will play three pieces – Ellington's Cotton Club Stomp and Blues for New Orleans, as well as Every Day I Have the Blues, a blues standard popularised by Memphis Slim and B.B. King. If successful, they will be among just 10 bands to advance to round two, where they will add Ellington's The Mooche to their repertoire. Only three bands will compete in Sunday's final.
Jason Ziino, Blackburn High's director of music, says Essentially Ellington is the most prestigious contest of its kind in the world. 'It's the pinnacle of jazz band performance and competition,' he says. 'If you're going to be a good big band or jazz ensemble, this is the place you want to be.'
It also means playing in one of New York's hallowed music rooms, the Rose Theatre at the Lincoln Centre for Performing Arts. 'You don't get to book that,' says Ziino. 'Schools can book Carnegie Hall and play there. You only get to play in that hall [the Rose] if you're good enough and get invited.'
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