A compilation of MSU's 2023 awards at the Jack Rudin Jazz Championship.

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With a third place finish in the national Rudin Jazz Championship held January 14 and 15 at Jazz at Lincoln Center in New York, the MSU Jazz Studies program has now placed in the top three in each of the first three years of the competition. 

In 2020, the program placed third in the inaugural event, then after the cancelation in 2021 due to COVID the program took first place in 2022. This year, the hardworking students of Jazz Orchestra I and the jazz octets earned their place in the finals once again, taking third. 

The annual event features up to ten of the nation’s most well-regarded university jazz programs invited to compete in a two-day invitational. MSU students and faculty, along with their peers from eight other programs this year, immersed themselves in intensive rehearsals and workshops culminating in two rounds of competition and a final concert on the Rose Theater stage.

Guiding the students through the competition this year were University Distinguished Professor of Jazz Bass and Director of Jazz Studies Rodney Whitaker, Associate Professor of Jazz Guitar and Associate Director of Jazz Studies Randy Napoleon, and Assistant Professor of Jazz Saxophone Walter Blanding, a longtime member of the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra who joined the MSU jazz faculty this academic year.

“I’m just so proud of this band,” Napoleon said while introducing the students in the jazz combo. “I love working with these young artists so much, I can’t tell you. It’s an inspiration.”

At the awards ceremony, Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Managing and Artistic Director Wynton Marsalis presented awards to the bands as well as individual recognition for students from several of the programs. In 2023, North Carolina Central University earned first-place honors, and second-place went to Temple University for the second year in a row. See the full awards information for 2023.

Individual and section honors went to the following MSU students:

• Joel Perez, Outstanding Trombone
• Jordan Anderson (Outstanding Piano - Honorable Mention)
• Sam Corey (Outstanding Clarinet - Honorable Mention)
• Hugh Downs (Outstanding Guitar - Honorable Mention)
• Outstanding Rhythm Section - Honorable Mention (Jonathon Muir-Cotton, Brandon Rose, Stephen Bowman, and Rueben Stump, bass; Christopher Minami, Ben Turner, Hugh Downs, and Levi Taple, guitar; Caleb Robinson, Joshua Watkins, Ciara Connolly, and David Alavarez III, drums; Jordan Anderson, and Sequoia Synder, piano)

A panel of judges comprised of distinguished jazz musicians and educators chose the overall and individual winners. The judges included Wynton Marsalis, Jeff Hamilton, Ted Nash, Catherine Russell, and Bijon Watson.

In remarks from the stage, Napoleon acknowledged the significance of having several supporters of MSU Jazz Studies in attendance in New York.

“We have so much community support for this program,” he said. “Actually, the president of our university is here tonight, our dean, and some of our beloved donors, and the credit union in our town, the MSUFCU. They’ve been supporting us. They help fund our tours and bringing in guests from out of state, and the president of MSUFCU is here. So, we’ve got a lot of love. I was walking around in the lobby, and I thought I was back in East Lansing!”

The Rudin Jazz Championship has quickly become the premiere collegiate jazz championship in the nation. Consecutive placement in the finals each of the first three years of the competition has solidified the reputation of MSU Jazz Studies as one of the top destinations for professional jazz training. 

“It was an amazing honor to support our outstanding jazz student artists in New York,” said Interim President Teresa K. Woodruff, Ph.D. “The arts are an essential element of a Spartan experience, and these students are exemplary in so many ways. My husband and I are thrilled to support them, whether that’s at home in East Lansing or wherever they are performing. We are extremely proud of them, the jazz program and our entire College of Music.”

MSU Jazz Orchestra I, finals of the 2023 Jack Rudin Jazz Championship
 

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The Jack Rudin Jazz Championship honors the legacy of Jack Rudin, longtime supporter of Jazz at Lincoln Center, and his founding support for Essentially Ellington, the organization’s signature transformative education program. Launched in 2020, right before the pandemic, the Jack Rudin Jazz Championship provides participating ensembles with quality literature and a forum for celebrating excellence and achievement, while introducing higher education to Jazz at Lincoln Center’s education methodology and philosophy—extending JALC’s educational mission into the sphere of professional development for the next generation of leading jazz artists.