Video recording of interview with John Murphy, UNT professor of jazz studies. Murphy discusses his youth in Baltimore, Maryland, during the 1960s and 1970s including his music education at Baltimore County Public Schools, and the musical influence of the Left Bank Jazz Society; His experience as a UNT student in the jazz studies and music theory programs (1981-1986); playing saxophone in the One O’clock Lab Band and at venues around Denton; His research as an ethnomusicologist studying Cuban and Brazilian music and work as a professor at Western Illinois University (1992-2001) then the University of North Texas (2001-2020) where he served in faculty and administrative roles to further develop the jazz studies program and help preserve the program’s history.

Ensemble performances program book from the 2020-2021 school year at the University of North Texas College of Music.

The purpose of this phenomenological study is to explore the experiences of Black graduates of historically Black colleges and universities who attend graduate school at predominately White institutions as they adjust academically and socially at these institutions. In-depth interviews provide knowledge as to what this special population of students' experience. Recommendations for faculty and administrators to assist with the recruitment and retention of these graduate students is also provided.

Video recording of Spring 2021 commencement ceremony held on the evening of Saturday, May 1. The in-person ceremony was at Apogee Stadium and honored the graduates of the doctoral, master's and bachelor's programs of the College of Music, G. Brint Ryan College of Business, and the Toulouse Graduate School. The ceremony includes opening and closing remarks by UNT President Neal Smatresk. Additional remarks are given by UNT System Board of Regent Dr. John Scott, Jr., UNT Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs Dr. Jennifer Cowley, and Vice President for University Advancement Dr. David Wolf. Also includes performances by Tyler Thomas, Wes Dziedzic, and the UNT Wind Orchestra conducted by Dr. Andrew Trachsel.

The New Yorker recently referred to Pat Metheny as “possibly the most influential jazz guitarist of the past five decades.” A native of Lee’s Summit, Missouri, just southeast of Kansas City, Metheny started playing in pizza parlors at age fourteen. By the time he graduated from high school he was the first-call guitarist for Kansas City jazz clubs, private clubs, and jazz festivals. Now 66, he attributes his early success to the local musical environment he was brought up in and the players and teachers who nurtured his talent and welcomed him into the jazz community. Metheny’s twenty Grammys in ten categories speak to his versatility and popularity. Despite five decades of interviews, none have conveyed in detail his stories about his teenage years. Beneath Missouri Skies also reveals important details about jazz in Kansas City during the sixties and early seventies, often overlooked in histories of Kansas City jazz. Yet this time of cultural change was characterized by an outstanding level of musicianship.

Ensemble performances program book from the 2020-2021 school year at the University of North Texas College of Music.

In the late 1970s legendary pianist Bill Evans was at the peak of his career. He revolutionized the jazz trio (bass, piano, drums) by giving each part equal emphasis in what jazz historian Ted Gioia called a “telepathic level” of interplay. It was an ideal opportunity for a sideman, and after auditioning in 1978, Joe La Barbera was ecstatic when he was offered the drum chair, completing the trio with Evans and bassist Marc Johnson. In Times Remembered, La Barbera and co-author Charles Levin provide an intimate fly-on-the-wall peek into Evans’s life, critical recording sessions, and behind-the-scenes anecdotes of life on the road. Joe regales the trio’s magical connection, a group that quickly gelled to play music on the deepest and purest level imaginable. He also watches his dream gig disappear, a casualty of Evans’s historical drug abuse when the pianist dies in a New York hospital emergency room in 1980. But La Barbera tells this story with love and respect, free of judgment, showing Evans’s humanity and uncanny ability to transcend physical weakness and deliver first-rate performances at nearly every show.

Catalog of undergraduate and graduate courses offered by Texas Tech University for the year 2021-2022, as well as general information about the university, programs, and policies.