An Afternoon of Jazz with the Greenhorns at the MGMA

Visit the Morris Graves Museum of Art for an afternoon of great music on Sunday, March 20^th at 3:00 pm. Enjoy An Afternoon of Jazz with Gregg Moore and the Greenhorns, and hear a wide variety of music from an eclectic mix of local small brass and percussion musicians.     

The Greenhorns consist of Gregg Moore- sousaphone, Dr. Gilbert Cline-trumpet, Jill Petricca- tenor saxophone, Jesse Garate- alto saxophone, Matt Wardynski-clarinet, and Seth Mattingly-drums & percussion. Listeners can expect to see/hear some of Humboldt County’s premier improvisers wending their way through a variety of music for a cordless sextet. Many styles will be explored in a program of mostly original music from Gregg Moore- Balkan brass, Brazilian samba, American jazz, Argentine tango, circus, California surf, Portuguese folk music and the indescribable in-between!

Humboldt native, Gregg Moore, has been working in the realm of small mobile wind and percussion ensembles since founding the influential (and still active) Available Jelly in Amsterdam, Holland in the late 1970’s with a group of other expat Humboldt musicians. The group was conceived as accompaniment for the dance and physical theater of a Utah based theater company giving it the freedom to experiment with a wide variety of music to supplement the equally wide variety of moods theater requires. 

                In the intervening years multi-instrumentalist, Moore, has expanded his interest to larger alternative community wind bands and research into the many indigenous brass band cultures that have grown up in the wake of colonialism.  He’s developed materials and conducted workshops across Europe and North America and during 10 years based in Portugal managed to spark a vibrant street band scene with his group ‘Os Macacos das Ruas de Évora’.

                The current instance of Gregg Moore’s exploration of the limits of such an ensemble is called ‘Greenhorns’ and features an appropriately eclectic mix of local horn players.  Gil Cline will be known to local listeners as the longtime professor of trumpet at HSU and the energy behind the Humboldt Bay Brass Band. Tenor saxophonist Jill Petricca is the principal flutist for the Eureka Symphony. Clarinetist Matt Wardynski has been making a name for himself keeping the clarinet alive as a jazz and improvising instrument in Humboldt County through performances with the acclaimed RLL trio.  Jesse Garate is a recent graduate from HSU and have elected to stay in the area, is rapidly making himself indispensable to a variety of ensembles such as Conman Bolo and the C&R Jazz Ensemble.  Seth Mattingly wound up his studies as a star of Dr. Eugene Novotny’s acclaimed percussion program of the HSU Music Department just in time for performances of all kinds to be curtailed.  

                In a typical exploration of the possibilities an ensemble of wind and percussion instruments presents, the Greenhorns set will range from original music written for the circus to Jazz, Funk, Pop Ballads, South African Kwela, Tango, Eastern European folk music, and more!  This all can be found at the Morris Graves Museum’s monthly event, An Afternoon of Jazz, with Gregg More and the Greenhorns on Sunday, March 20^th at 3:00 pm!