News
Jazz Returns to the AHCCB Stage
The Arlington Heights Community Concert Band is excited to announce the revival of the Arlington Jazz Exchange (AJE), an official sub-group of the concert band dedicated to the study and performance of big band jazz music. The AJE is directed by Adam Velez, the concert band’s lead trumpet player. Like the concert band, the AJE is an all-volunteer group, currently featuring seventeen instrumentalists and one vocalist, with the majority also being full-time members of the concert band.
The AJE draws the majority of its repertoire from the “Great American Songbook,” representing a diverse cross section of quintessential historical and modern jazz artists such as Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Glenn Miller, Ella Fitzgerald, Buddy Rich, Maynard Ferguson, Gordon Goodwin’s Big Phat Band, and many others.
The Arlington Jazz Exchange’s inaugural concert on April 2nd, 2023 is called, fittingly, Introductions. Music selections shine the spotlight on several of the new group’s members as well as showcasing the talents of the ensemble. Already in the works is a summer concert featuring hot jazz and cool tunes to beat the Midwest heat. The AJE looks forward to keeping the Arlington community’s toes tapping and fingers snapping as we celebrate the diverse music of jazz!
Introducing our AJE Director
Adam Velez graduated from Berklee College of Music (Boston, MA) in 1986, where he studied the Trumpet under his mentor Louis “Lou” Mucci (Gill Evans, Miles Davis, Claude Thornhill, etc.). He also focused on several other studies through the school’s Professional Music program, including Music Business and Copyright, Jazz Arranging/Composition, and Conducting. In addition to performing regularly with several other ensembles in the greater Chicagoland area, including our very own AHCCB, Adam works as the Sr. Graphic Designer and Art Director for Bolchazy-Carducci Publishers (Wauconda, IL), a small independent educational publisher that specializes in creating textbooks for the study of Latin and Greek languages.