The Adolphe Sax Birthday Recital, featuring the Nebraska Saxophone Project, will be at 7:30 p.m. Nov. 5 in the Westbrook Music Building Performance Hall, Room 130. The concert is free and open to the public.
“The Nebraska Saxophone Project is a new ensemble I’m starting with former students and professional players,” said Paul Haar, associate professor of saxophone. “This particular concert will feature a Quartet made up of alumni Daniel Oshiro, Wade Howles and Bob Fuson. We wanted to take the founder’s birthday as an opportunity to showcase this new ensemble.”
The concert celebrates the birthday of Adolphe Sax (1814-1894), born on Nov. 6, who is a Belgian inventor and musician who invented the saxophone in the early 1840s, patenting it in 1846.
Haar said their program is varied with music ranging from Bach to African and Latin American music. Haar started playing the saxophone when he got in trouble for talking in class in seventh grade.
“I was given the option to play in the jazz band or fail,” he said. “The very first time I heard a recording of Stan Getz, though, I was hooked. There was something about the sound, the color, the expressiveness of the instrument that was just different from everything else.”
Xin Gao, saxophone, also will perform Sunday, Nov. 2 at 5:30 p.m. in the Westbrook Music Building Performance Hall in Room 130. The concert is free and open to the public.
Gao is associate professor of music (saxophone) at Truman State University. A native of Chengdu, China, he is an internationally recognized performer and educator. He has built a versatile career as a soloist, chamber musician and clinician across the U.S. and Asia. He won first prize in the Music Teachers National Association (MTNA) Young Artist Competition in 2011.
“He is doing a tour of the Midwest,” Haar said. “He will be doing a program of contemporary saxophone music. He will also be doing a clinic on Nov. 2 from 2-4 p.m., which is open to the public.”
Haar said guest artist visits are important for students in his saxophone studio.
“We hope our students get to learn about the diversity of their instrument, new techniques and see people at a professional level playing the same instrument that they play,” Haar said.
