Len Aruliah Sextet gig and end of semester

The Spring Semester is over and I am taking a little breather this afternoon before plunging into the many other projects and piles of work that have been put on hold over the past few weeks. After adjudicating a bunch of grad recitals and hearing some of the wonderful work that was done by the students at Capilano this semester I feel very grateful to be a music educator and to work with such intelligent, creative, and interesting students.  Thanks all for a great year!

Wednesday night I played a great gig with the Len Aruliah Sextet at Presentation House Studio.  The house was packed to capacity  Len had a new batch of tunes beautifully and intricately arranged for the band:  Joe Poole (drums), Brent Gubbels (bass), Kristian Alexandrov (piano), Colin Maskell (tenor), plus Len and me.  I always have a great time playing with any of these players, but it was the first time with this particular grouping.  I thought the band played especially well.   Joe really kept things exciting and challenged everyone to play on a higher level.  What an amazing drummer and musician he is.  I'll be playing with him again next week at the same venue with Coat Cooke (saxes) and Clyde Reed (bass).