Jazz Ensemble

I was trying to think of which encounter project I wanted to do when my cousin told me she was going to a jazz concert for one of her classes. I thought this would be the perfect situation to go listen to some music that I wasn’t familiar with at all. We went to the Jazz Ensemble at the Musical Arts Center on Monday, October 22 at 8p.m.


When we first walked in, I immediately noticed that the majority of people I saw were much older than us. I thought that was interesting because I feel like I’ve always heard about jazz being like “older people’s music.” I didn’t want to throw it into a group right from the beginning, but it was funny that it turned out that way. I also noticed that there was a “uniform” being worn among the musicians. All the men who were playing, as well as the conductor, were wearing tuxedos and the women were wearing black dresses and black heels. I guess this sort of gave the entire situation a classy or elegant feel. I also noticed that there was a definite stage set up before the concert began as well as kind of a backdrop that looked like it was supposed to help echo the music back out towards the audience. This just made me think about all the different factors that play into a folk group’s cultural performance like we’ve discussed in class.


At first I didn’t think I was going to like the concert because the first song was really loud and had a lot of high pitched trumpet sounds. However, I kept listening and ended up really liking the next couple of songs. I could tell that there definitely is a sense of tradition within jazz because the conductor was introducing songs originally played by jazz legends, like Quincy Jones and Miles Davis. I really liked the fourth song they played, “Quintessence” by Quincy Jones because it was much calmer and a little softer sounding than the others. After the concert, my cousin told me that the conductor, David Baker, was her teacher for jazz class. She said he told them at one point, he played with some of the jazz legends. I thought that was really cool because I felt like I was listening to something directed by someone who was really in the thick of the jazz tradition. Looking back on the situation, I did enjoy some of the different songs. I’m glad I tried something new because now I feel like I have a little more cultural knowledge under my belt. This is my response to the Musical Performance Visit project.

Chapter 3 Reflection

I suppose it makes the most sense to me to refer back to my family to describe different traditions within my life because I’m actually looking forward to participating in another one in a few weeks--Thanksgiving. I was reading about how tradition is thought of in terms of the “lore” that is communicated between people, but also in terms of the way it is communicated between people (65). This made me think about my family because it is pretty much understood that when we are all together, we will start joking around and my brother will start to do his impressions of people. The jokes and comments were not simply spoken, they were almost acted in a funny voice. In order to comment back, we had to use another voice that would complement the first one. This used to be something that happened all the time, but now since he lives in California, it has changed to occurring basically on holidays because that’s when he can come home. I feel like this is an example of a tradition that has been longstanding, but now is changing somewhat, although it still continues when it can. I guess its kind of like we want it to continue, so we adapted it so that it could continue with our new situation (75).
Another tradition that I feel is becoming more important to me, but really important to my parents, is having everyone together on holidays. It used to be that we all lived at home and so we obviously were all around for all the holidays. That has changed over the past few years, and will continue to change because of college and life starting for the rest of the kids. My brother moved away to California, so now it’s a really special time when he comes home and we can all be together for holidays. I can tell that my parents want to salvage any special time like that because soon we will all have our own families, and things may change again.
In terms of my family, there are different traditions that I feel I saw the beginning of, but more just the beginning of them within my family--as opposed to the beginning of a tradition in general. For example, every time one of the kids has a birthday, my grandparents send us a card with some money in it. When my parents had my older brother, I don’t know if my grandparents knew if he’d be the only one or not. Once I was born, they assumed it’d be at least the two of us, and probably more, and they started sending us little bits of money on birthdays. This made me think about the tradition being both conservative and dynamic because the whole idea of giving a child a gift on their birthday is relatively old and doesn‘t depend on me, which makes it more conservative, but it is also dynamic because as we got older the amounts changed correlating with the needs or wants of a child that age (77). I suppose a lot of people probably get money from grandparents on their birthday, but I feel like its special for me because whether or not they are with me or not on my birthday, they tell me the same thing. They always say, “Happy Birthday, we just wanted you to have a little something special for you.” Maybe that in itself is more of a tradition to me than the actual gift. Anyway, I think its really cool that so many different things are imbedded within the folk group of my family. I never really thought about it, but there are a lot of things that keep us bonded together, that other people wouldn’t understand. This post is my response to the Chapter 3 Reflection question.

2nd Peer Comment

I decided to do my review on Hoosier174’s blog about trying sushi for the first time. It stuck out to me because I feel like a lot of people are really skeptical about trying sushi for the first time. People always say that it looks gross, or it is not cooked so it might not be good for you, etc. What I think a lot of people don’t realize is that it is so good for you, nutritionally speaking. I thought it was good that a trainer recommended sushi rather than some kind of shake or chicken, chicken, chicken diet. I found that once you get over the different textures in your mouth, you realize that everything blends well together and tastes really good.
The other really neat thing I noticed in his blog was that he talked about how you typically order at a sushi restaurant, marking down your choices and giving them to the waitress. This is different from how we usually order at restaurants, with the waitress writing down our orders for us, but it makes for a new experience. I think I was spurred to comment on this because I went to a well known sushi restaurant in California this summer, but didn’t know what to order because everything was so complex sounding. My brother ordered for our family, and we ended up getting these elaborately displayed plates of sushi. They were beautiful and delicious…although fairly pricey as well. I guess that’s the downside to sushi, it usually costs a few dollars more than your typical burger and fries. Hoosier174’s blog made me think about how much I want to eat sushi again, so if you need a little push, check his blog out at http://hoosier174.blogspot.com/. This post is my response to the 2nd peer comment.

I was sitting in my criminal justice class when our teacher started making jokes about sports teams and some of the players. This was normal for our class so I think everyone was ready to hear what the professor had to say. He was talking about different college basketball teams, and then said, “Speaking of basketball, have you guys heard the Shaq joke?” We all said we hadn’t heard it, so he proceeded to say, “What do you do if you are losing to the Lakers and you want to make sure you win?” We said we didn’t know, so he said, “You foul Shaq, that way he has to make free throws! We all know he can’t make those under pressure, or at all for that matter.” A lot of people started laughing, especially the guys in the class. That made me think a little about folklore because you could say that these guys are all within a folklore group of shared interest involving sports (40). There were some people, mainly girls, who didn’t seem to understand the joke at all, so the guys had to explain it to them. Without anyone asking, one of the girls confessed she didn’t know anything about basketball, which is why she didn’t understand the joke.
I thought it was funny because I watch a lot of basketball with my boyfriend, and he has always made comments about how funny it is that Shaq can’t make free throws. You would expect a professional basketball player to be able to make a free throw because at every other level you’re taught that free throws can win games. They offer you a chance to get points without anyone interfering with you. That’s why the joke is funny, its mocking the fact that Shaq can’t make free throws (even though they’re supposed to be “free” points) and how it is such common knowledge among basketball fans.
I was checking on Google.com to see if I could find different versions of this joke, but all I found were all different sites mentioning how bad Shaq is at shooting free throws. My boyfriend mentioned that this joke refers to the strategy “Hack-a-Shaq.” He said that anyone who is a real fan of basketball would know about this term because it is such common knowledge within that folk group. There are all sorts of sites that talk about this, which is “hacking” or intentionally fouling Shaq, forcing him to make free throws (which he usually won’t) and then getting the ball back. You can find this at http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Hack-A-Shaq. He also said that jokes like this came once Shaq became a part of the LA Lakers (late 90s) because that's when he was the most dominant. It was so hard to defend him that they would foul him, he'd miss the free throws, and then they'd get the ball back. you would like to read some more funny basketball jokes, check out http://www.internationalbasketball.com/basketballhumor.html. *Picture is from CNN Sports Illustrated website. It can be found at http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/statitudes/news/2000/12/26/shaq_freethrows/t1_shaq_all-01.jpg

This post is my response to the Joke Encounter Assignment.