Jazz band brings refreshing change

By Jina Tedmori
Daily Forty-Niner

Though the band that played the University Student Union West Terrace Tuesday brought an atypical sound, it met typical results.

Amid the recent slew of hip-hop acts to perform on campus, the jazz band Edmund Velasco Quartet brought some low key but uplifting jazz to an indifferent Cal State Long Beach audience. For the band, it was a sort of homecoming.

"I am very excited to be playing here again," said the saxophone player Edmund Velasco. "This is the first place I played fifteen years ago when I was a student." Velasco, the trumpet player Kye Paliner and keyboard player Ken Tresader are all Cal State Long Beach alumni.

The band met the same fate as many bands who have played at the Union this year, as they struggled to win the crowds attention.

Students eating on the terrace appeared to be more interested in their food than listening to the music. However this did not stop the band from putting forth a solid performance. Their first song was a smooth relaxing number called "Divide and Conquer," which met the approval of the crowd.

"They are different from most bands that play at school," said Colette Constantino, a senior hotel management major. "It was a nice mellow change to relax and eat lunch to."

Toby Holmes on bass and Jimmy Ford on drums set a smooth tone for the horns to blend with.

"It's fresh because I use Jazz as a tool to help me create my Hip-Hop music," said Shannon Bray, a senior business accounting major.

Though the band did not catch as much attention from passers as the bands that have performed in recent weeks, it was received praise from students who did stop to take in the music.

"The music is not quite as up beat as I had expected but they are very enjoyable to listen to," said Scott Coleman, a junior kinesiology major.

Very much a departure from typical Union bands, the classic style of jazz from the band was a refreshing change of pace.