Luher College Jazz Orchestra to perform at Hope Lutheran in Fargo

As part of their five-stop April tour, the Luther College Jazz Orchestra will perform at Hope Lutheran Church, North Campus, 2900 Broadway N, at 7 p.m. Saturday, April 20.  

The performance by the 20-member Jazz Orchestra is open to the public. A freewill donation will be accepted.

Under the direction of Juan Tony Guzman, associate professor of music and education at Luther, the Jazz Orchestra has come to be recognized as one of the outstanding liberal arts college jazz ensembles in the Upper Midwest.

Guzman, a native of the Dominican Republic and a 1990 Luther graduate, has led the ensemble through the many genres of jazz for more than 17 years in addition to maintaining an active career as an arranger and band, orchestral and choral conductor across the world.

The 2013 Jazz Orchestra tour concerts will include classic standards by Dizzy Gillespie, Chick Corea, Astor Piazzolla, Duke Ellington and Charlie Parker in addition to more recent compositions by Gordon Goodwin, Rick Lawn, and Luther's own composer-in-residence, Brooke Joyce. Traditional Brazilian dance music arranged for the ensemble will also be featured to round out a diverse program of Latin, swing and fusion styles.

The Jazz Orchestra is one of the four main touring ensembles of Luther College with an annual tour schedule including international travel every four years. Recent performances include the Festival No Improviso, in Curitiba, Brazil, the Iowa Jazz Championships, and the Iowa Bandmasters Association Conference. The Jazz Orchestra has recorded two albums, "Transformations: Celebrating Jazz at Luther" and "On the Move," with a third album to be released later this year.

Luther College is home to one of the largest collegiate music programs in the world with six choirs, three bands, three orchestras, two jazz bands and numerous chamber ensembles, totaling nearly 1,000 student musicians. Luther students perform in large ensembles, master classes, and faculty-coached chamber groups and jazz combos. More than 300 music majors study music performance, education, composition, theory, jazz, history, ethnomusicology and church music.