On Sunday, the Amherst College Jazz Ensemble will present its spring semester concert. The Ensemble, directed by Bruce Diehl, will play works by Wayne Shorter, Lee Morgan, Thelonious Monk, Duke Ellington and Matt Harris. The program will also include several pieces often associated with Frank Sinatra. A highlight of the concert will be the premiere of an all-new work by up-and-coming composer, saxophonist and Yamaha Performing Artist Nathan Childers. This new work, entitled "City Scape," is the first piece in a new series of commissioned works written specifically for the Ensemble. "City Scape" is a three-movement work for jazz big band, and according to Childers, the composition "reflects the New York experience."

Childers is a particularly strong choice to headline the new "Robin McBride Jazz Commission Series" at the College. He is a graduate of UMass Amherst, where he studied with Dr. Yusuf Lateef. He also holds an M.M. degree (in Jazz Studies and Contemporary Media) from the prestigious Eastman School of Music at the University of Rochester. In addition to his compositions, Childers is also a distinguished performer, possessing an impressive resumé. He has performed with such musicians as Maria Schneider, Toots Theilmans and Bobby McFerrin, and the list of venues in which he has played reads like a recounting of the sacred sites of jazz, including Birdland and The Knitting Factory. Childers also leads several ensembles of his own, including the Nathan Childers New York Big Band, the Nathan Childers Quintet and the Nathan Childers Trio. Also, much like Diehl, Childers has distinguished himself as an educator, working as an instructor or teaching classes at Amherst, UMass and the Eastman School. Childers currently resides in New York City.

Childers expressed his excitement at the College serving as the site of his compostion's premiere. "I'm thrilled to be the initial composer for The 2005 McBride Jazz Commission Series. My piece, 'City Scape,' chronicles the highs and lows of the New York City lifestyle. There is no other place on earth where the colors and expressions of life are more exposed and diverse. If you walk any street in this town, you can't escape the rich textures of sight and sound that surround you. My three-movement composition exposes some of these vivid moments of beauty and hardship. To the curious observer, New York City truly is art in motion."

The "Robin McBride Jazz Commission Series" is named after Robin McBride '59, a strong supporter of jazz performance and education at Amherst. The series of original works is meant to keep the Ensemble in contact with the ever-evolving state of modern jazz, even as it performs and pays tribute to the many greats of jazz history. This initiative is only the latest move by a jazz program whose vitality and continued importance has been displayed for decades. Initially a rebellious movement practiced semi-underground by talented Amherst artists such as Chuck Stevenson '50, Robin McBride '59 and David Lahm '63, jazz finally began to receive the attention it deserved when Amherst established programs for jazz performance and studies in the 1980s.

Since then, a line of educators and performers, including Don Abrams, current Williams College jazz director Andy Jaffe, and Diehl have brought jazz at Amherst to a never-before seen level. In Diehl's tenure, the jazz program has grown to house several combos, playing a wide variety of jazz and blues styles, and jazz duos in addition to the Ensemble. The music department currently offers a two-course series in jazz theory and improvisation along with a seminar (cross-listed with the black studies department) entitled "The Birth of Bebop." With the growing numbers of students studying jazz and playing in large-group and combo situations, jazz is truly flourishing at the College.