In Thursday’s (3/13) Modesto Bee (California), Marijke Rowland speaks to clarinetist Dave Bennett about a concert this week featuring Bennett’s Clarinet Swing Kings and the Modesto Symphony Orchestra. “A musical prodigy with an ear for the past … Bennett … began playing professionally at 13 and touring a year later, last played with the orchestra in 2010. His return with his sextet brings back the big-band sound of the 1930s, 1940s and beyond.… Bennett, his sextet and vocalist Rebecca Kilgore will be joined by conductor David Lockington and the orchestra in a program that runs through the music of jazz greats like Artie Shaw, Pete Fountain, Jimmy Dorsey, Woody Herman and Benny Goodman. ‘Working with a symphony orchestra on this kind of music really works well,’ Bennett said. ‘It’s like a big band only amplified. It’s a huge band.’ … The orchestra program will salute great jazz clarinetists. Bennett said it is music that has endured because of its quality. ‘Music from that era was just quality stuff…. Whenever people of any age … hear it, they like it.’ ”
Posted March 14, 2014
