The Kalamazoo Concert Band explored a century of American standards in its “Pops” concert, featuring guest vocalist Jennifer Roberts.
Host Keith Thompson opened the evening, which was presented free of charge courtesy of sponsor Keystone Solutions Group of Kalamazoo, with additional support from the Irving S. Gilmore Foundation. Thompson also welcomed a Western Michigan University music student who performed bass with the band for the evening.
Conductor Thomas G. Evans led the band through a medley of Broadway showstoppers to open the program. Trombonist and assistant conductor Brian Shetterly later performed a duet arrangement of “Blue Moon,” a song Thompson noted has a disputed authorship history — while credited to Rodgers and Hart, a New York Times report has cited a competing claim from a woman who said her father composed it. Thompson did not resolve the dispute for the audience, presenting it as an open question in the song’s history.
Roberts, a singer and actress with a musical theater and cabaret background, joined the band for several numbers from the Great American Songbook, including Duke Ellington’s “It Don’t Mean a Thing (If It Ain’t Got That Swing),” Harold Arlen and Ted Koehler’s “Stormy Weather,” and Jimmy McHugh and Dorothy Fields’ “I Can’t Give You Anything But Love.” She told the audience it was her first time performing with the Kalamazoo Concert Band.
The band also performed a medley honoring choreographer Jerome Robbins’ Broadway work, including music from “West Side Story,” “The King and I,” and “Fiddler on the Roof.” Roberts later returned to sing George and Ira Gershwin’s “They Can’t Take That Away From Me” and other Gershwin standards, along with Irving Berlin’s “Puttin’ on the Ritz.” The concert closed with Roberts performing “Feeling Good.”
