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YSU students compose and record jazz album
By GUY D’ASTOLFO
YOUNGSTOWN
Lauren Eisenreich and Chris Rudzinskas have high aspirations.
Toward that end, the two recent graduates of the Dana School of Music at Youngstown State University have produced a jazz CD of original compositions titled “Aspire.”
The two enlisted some of their fellow students to write and record the songs on the all-instrumental album.
Eisenreich wrote three of the nine songs, and Rudzinskas wrote one. Other composers were Vinny Vivacqua, Stephen Harvey and Nicholas Jones.
A Pittsburgh-area native who graduated in May, Eisenreich was the president of the Youngstown Jazz Collective at YSU. She called the “Aspire” project a great way to culminate their studies.
It was also an opportunity to record their own music with some of the best players at the Dana. The album, in fact, was recorded at the studio in YSU’s Bliss Hall, home of the music school.
Michael Crist, interim dean of the College of Creative Arts and Communication at YSU, has praise for Eisenreich’s efforts.
“Lauren is one of the most industrious and entrepreneurial-minded students I know,” said Crist. “She has motivation, desire and the ability to make a huge impact on music in America.”
The tastes and influences of each composer are manifested on the songs on “Aspire.”
Eisenreich said a dichotomy was at work. “We are all interested in similar artists, and that unifies the record, but we also have different tastes, so it is diverse,” said the trombone player. “I am more interested in modern jazz, and ‘Countermeasures’ [the album’s opening cut] reflects that. We all get along so well, so it uniquely ties the styles together.”
Eisenreich said that Dave Morgan, a professor at the Dana, was influential in the writing process for all of the students. “He is a teacher and also a mentor and composer,” said Eisenreich.
In addition to Eisenreich and Rudzinskas, who is also from the Pittsburgh area, the others who wrote or performed the songs on “Aspire” are Clay Colley of Canfield; Vivacqua, Boardman; Zach Connolly, Youngstown; Anthony Kunovic, Canfield; Harvey, Rochester, Pa.; Jones, Pittsburgh; John Vitullo, Austintown; and Frank Toncar, Cortland.
Eisenreich will assemble a group consisting of most of these players and maybe a few others to perform at the Summer Festival of the Arts on July 11 and 12 at YSU, and also at a record-release show July 20 at Christopher’s in downtown Youngstown. The CD is already available through iTunes, Amazon and other retail websites.
At the end of summer, Eisenreich will head to Rochester, N.Y., to attend the Eastman School of Music as a graduate student to continue studies in classical performance. After that, she will pursue a doctorate with a goal of becoming a music professor.
Rudzinskas is an engineer at Delphi Packard in Warren, and Colley is the music director at Howland United Methodist Church.